A Silent Connection
by ArthurSG
Summary: Once at Atlas, the weight of losing Pyrrha sets in and Jaune seeks to find solace in his feelings, comes across a peculiar mute girl. They soon find common ground in the pain of losing a loved one. But the mute has plans of her own. Neo wants nothing more than revenge on little red,and maybe Jaune can heal her ally. But with time could the bonds of loss sway the mute to a new path?
1. Chapter 1

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

Ruby paced back and force in their tiny cell. Her companions just stared wide eyed and their friend's strange behavior. Normally Ruby wasn't one to complain about things, always the glass half-full gal, so her ranting on everything that went wrong since starting school, at the prestigious school for Huntsman, Beacon Academy, just seemed wrong.

"I cannot believe them Yang! Why did they throw us in jail?"

"Like I told you for the hundredth time, sis, They. Are. Being. Jerks," the blond bombshell said.

"Actually they were just doing their job," the collected white haired Weiss corrected. "We stole a ship and invaded their air space. Of course we would be arrested."

"But we saved Argus from a humongous Grimm, defeated a giant robot, and even took down a wanted terrorist! We should get a hero's welcome, not this." Ruby spread her arms wide to show off their humble cell.

The quite Blake finally spoke up from the corner of their cell. "We didn't intend to take him down. It was pure self-defense. And if we didn't he still would have stalked me all the way here, that is, if he didn't kill me right then and there. Right Yang?'

"Dang it, don't pull me back into your drama kitty-cat, but yeah, she has a point Rubes. It was pretty much kill or be killed. Plus we can't really report that we killed the guy, or well be labeled as murderers and thieves."

"I think you have to add property damage, vandalism, and disturbing the peace to those charges Yang," the near emotionless Ren added. "If Cordivan wanted to, she could have all those charges brought against us for fighting her giant robot, which was Atlas government, property and tech."

"But at least we stopped the god dang Leviathan grim!" Ruby stressed.

"Yeah we were so cool, sneaking in to fire the killing blow, while all the army was distracted with the small fry grim. And then BAM‼ We all hit it with all we had and you used your magic eyes to turn it all to stone and then, I came down with my all mighty hammer and SMASHED IT TO SMITHEREENS‼"

Jaune groaned "Nora we didn't do any of that. We helped hold off the small fry and Ruby only petrified the outside of the Leviathan. It was Cordivan and her giant robot, which we damaged, that landed the killing blow. And Ren, I thought correcting Nora was your job?"

"It's not a job, just something I do. I just didn't feel like doing it this time. I rather liked her rendition of our feats this time too."

Jaune groaned into his hand again.

"Okay maybe Argus was a bust, but we still helped a lot of people in Haven, stopping Salem's crew, outing their headmaster as a traitor, and retrieving the relic of knowledge, right." Ruby fought for the rights to keep complaining.

This time it was her drunken uncle that corrected her, while still nursing the hangover from when the confiscated his flask. "Let me get this straight, kido. You went them to treat us like heroes for stopping an enemy that only we knew existed, retrieving an item that is straight out of a fantasy story, and outing a headmaster that had already crippled Mistral's Hunter numbers by killing them all off, and he himself was found dead in his office with NO proof of his actual betrayal?"

"Ah Yeah?" Ruby said a little sheepishly.

"Kido, all that stuff is things we could never explain to others or have them believe it. The only good thing that we could take credit for is stopping the White Fang from tearing that place apart and killing any students there. And really that would mostly be Blake here, for bringing her whole island kingdom with her to get in their way."

"Well, we all fought at the battle for Beacon. Right. That has to count for something," Ruby trailed off. Even she knew that would not help them, or something they should not even want respect for. They lost the battle for Beacon. Their school a complete ruin and the city of Vale devastated. They all lost so much in that battle, even close friends. They all knew it too. None of them spoke a word to that. The silence and hung heads were more than enough for Ruby to retreat in on herself and sit beside her sister.

~~00000~~

No one really knew how long they've been locked up, there were no clocks and their scrolls were confiscated. The silence after Ruby's rant was heavy and full of sorrow.

Oscar looked over his friends. Because of Ozpin, the immortal soul currently residing in his head, or himself, that's what they all were to him, even Jaune, and they were in pain. He saw it written across all their faces. The loss, devastation, and the choices they made during the battle of beacon. It weighed on them all, especially Jaune. He sat in his corner of the cell across from Oscar. His eyes closed and he would occasionally heave a long and labored breath as if trying to repress his sadness and tears. Jaune's pain was a direct result of Ozpin, and by extension his, actions. It was because of Ozpin's attempt to transfer the maiden powers to Pyrrha Nikos that got the girl killed. The girl Jaune once loved. He didn't blame Jaune for hating him over that.

Oscar looked over the rest of the group. Beside Jaune sat Ren and Nora. They seem content as they sat hand in hand. Nora, a usual ball of infinite energy, was solemn and quite resting her head on her love's shoulder. Oscar heard the two of them grew up as orphans together and has faced every hardship together too. He guessed they were so resigned, because, they still had each other and were able to draw strength from one another. A little further down sat Yang and Ruby. Yang looked upset as she stared at the nub of her right arm. The guards confiscated her prosthetic arm since it had a built in shotgun. But at the same time she looked like a sister. The way she cradled a sad and wilted Ruby in her good arm, how she put her anger aside to tend to Ruby. No one would argue that those two were not sisters right now, even if they don't look alike. Across from the glum Ruby sat Qrow, her beloved uncle. He seemed to be broken. An exhausted man that had lost everything he once fought for. Beside Qrow sat Blake and Weiss. The former looked troubled and worn, but the small curl on the corner of her lips gave her an air of relief, as if a large weight was removed from her shoulders. The later seemed sad, and annoyed. Oscar knew Weiss had run away from her home, and Atlas, to pressure her dream of being a huntress. For her to be back in Atlas and locked up, must be really hard on her. Then there was Maria, the only defensive barrier between him and the rest of the group that had a bone to pick with the man in his head. Maria saw him as a kid in over his head. She was sleeping at the moment. He was glad she chose to sit beside him.

With the obvious acceptation of Maria, all of his friends had been at the battle for beacon and now carried the scares of that battle. Oscar was not there himself. He was, surprisingly, safe outside the walls of Vale during the battle. But he had Ozpin's soul within him, and that man's anguish certainly seeps through to himself. Ozpin was there. He was even killed during it, but Ozpin has lived many lives and seen much tragedy. All of the deaths and loss Ozpin has faced had become a jumbled mess of scattered memories and mountains of indistinguishable emotions of pain. It was different for Oscar. He felt their pain. He knew their pain. He almost lived the battle of Beacon with them. But it didn't feel like his. These were not his emotions. They were Ozpin's. In time they would become his. When the soul of Ozpin consumes his own, then those memories would be his and he would no longer exist.

He ran his finger through his hair, frustrated. Ozpin has long since stopped making his presence known within his mind. It seemed that Ozpin was now content with being a passenger. A passenger who was letting their memories and ambitions seep out and wash over him. What were his, own ambitions and emotions? Had he really wanted to be a Hunter, to work with team RWBY, and the others? He knew he wanted that right now, but was that his desire because he got to know them? Or was that part of Ozpin's desire to kill Salem?

He looked up to Ruby, who meant his eyes and tried to put on a kind smile for him, as she had her head buried into her sisters side. And with her soft smile Oscar felt his troubles disappear. Ruby was close to his age, but has been through so much more, yet she always tried to be her best and look to the brighter side of things. It gave him the strength to face his own troubles and ease his worry over mortality. Even if he didn't have a lot of time left, he would make it count.

Oscar's thoughts were interrupted as the door to their cell clanked open. Oscar ducked under the cane of a startled Maria, who swung it in an attempt to hinder the noise that woke her.

"Hey watch it, please," he pleaded

Maria's mechanical eyes, visors, cybernetics, whatever they were, spun and whirled as she tried to focus on the person standing in the open cell doorway. "James is that you my boy?"

James Ironwood, the Atlas military general and the Headmaster of Atlas academy stood before them. The man known for being heavy handed and stern looked over to Maria and his face lit up like a Christmas tree. "Maria! I had no clue you were in here. God it's been far too long. How have you been?" Ironwood stooped down to embrace Maria in an earnest hug, who had hopped off her seat to stand before him.

Maria returned his embrace for a moment and then stepped back. She chuckled to herself. "Oh James it certainly has, and I've been doing just fine. Well until these brats ruined my trip to Atlas for my eye check. That reminds me." She swiftly swatted Ironwood over the head with the skull handle of her cane. "What took you so long to bail me out of here?! I placed my call over an hour ago. I had to sit though these brats sulking over things that happened more than a year ago. The drunken one is the worst of all of them." She shook her head. "Such wasted energy."

The oppressive, gloomy atmosphere was completely gone now. In its place sheer shock and disbelief. Weiss was the first to voice her confusion.

"Maria, you know General Ironwood?"

Maria glanced over to Weiss "General?" she turned back to Ironwood, "James you didn't tell me you got promoted." She threw a playful punch into the man side.

Ironwood laughed "I've been a general and Headmaster of Atlas Academy for quite some time now, Maria" The smuggest smile to ever appear on ironwoods face left the other occupants a gasp "Perhaps your memory is starting to fail you in your old age."

Maria gave James another whack of her cane. "I may be old, but my memory is just fine. Why, I could recall the time you vomited, all over your date to the school dance." Ironwood flinched, his teeth grit, she had him. "Mhm, poor miss Willow Schnee. She took a chance on you that night. And what she gets for it? Her beautiful white dressed turned a horrible green."

"YOU THOUGH UP ON MY MOTHER‼" Weiss screeched, jumping out of her seat.

"Oh he certainly did Weiss, not only that he also tripped on his own vomit. He knocked them both on the floor, sprawling in it," Maria continued.

"Ohhhhh! Imbeciles! All of them!" Weiss stomped her way to the back of the cell and sat herself between Yang and Ruby, the latter struggling to stifle a fit of giggles.

With Ruby's giggles opening the flood gates, the rest of the gang burst into laughter, Qrow slapping his knee to regain control of himself. "Oh Gods this is gold. Maria I auta kiss you for this. Geez just wait until Winter hears of this! Oh the look she'll make. It'll be just like that!" He pointed across the room to a scowling Weiss.

Maria cringed. "The only way you're kissing me is if I'm a thousand times more drunk than you at your worse, Qrow. Don't make me bring my cane on you too."

The man held his hands up in defeat not wanting to bring on the old woman's wrath.

Ironwood coughed meaningfully into his fist. "Well now that pleasantries are out of the way let's get you all out of here." He gestured for them to follow as he walked out of the cell.

* * *

~~00000~~

* * *

It was the end of a long and exciting day for Roger, a beat cop for the prestigious Atlas Police Department. He thought it would be a boring day filled with paper work. Oh how wrong he was. He got to watch over the craziest bunch of detainees he's ever seen. I mean who steels a freaking Atlas air ship and then delivers themselves to Atlas. And hey he even got the see the great General Ironwood taken down a few pegs by an old lady. He laughed to himself. All that was left for his great day was the daily inspection of the incoming dust cars.

Everything looked normal to Roger. He threw back one of the tarps to check inside a car, nothing there. A shattering of glass made him whirl around and an umbrella to the temple was the last thing he would ever see.

~00000~~

Neo back flipped out of the mining cart, landing on its rim. Looking around she found about twelve guards, officers, whatever, she didn't care. There were twelve things that she would get to relieve some stress with. She grinned and bowed, the things just stared at her before one shouted intruder.

He was the first to die. Neo leapt to him and plunged the exposed tip of her blade, and tip of her umbrella, deep into the throat of that loud mouth.

"Open Fire," another called.

Neo quickly spun, pivoting around the corpse at the end of her umbrella. She used the unfortunate deceased man as a meat shield. Sure her perfect weapon, Hush, could have easily deflected all of their puny dust shells, but this way was more fun.

They paused to reload. She peak her head out from behind the side of her dead thing with a murderous grin, both eyes a pale cream. She got the reaction she wanted. Many of them paled and fumbled with their clips, others backed away.

She shoved the body off her blade and let it fall to the tracks below with a horrible mushy splat, then vanished behind her semblance. The murmurs of the play-things were wonderful and filled with fear. She snuck into the center of a large batch of them, about six, that thought it was safe to put themselves all in one area.

She dispelled her semblance scaring the daylight out of them as they all turned to her. She greeted them with her cocky smile and waited for one of them to make a move.

One fool, a woman, pulled out a long knife and thrust it towards her. Neo leapt up onto the woman's arm and kicked her across the face as she back flipped over the head of the man opposite the woman and kicked him forward. The man stumbled and embedded himself on the woman's knife.

The man groaned and backed away, the woman shocked. She had stabbed her comrade in the thigh. He was bleeding badly. Neo tried to watch these lovely events unfold but the other four rushed her, swinging batons and blades at her. Armatures, that's all they were. She expertly danced between the myriad of objects swinging at her, even landed a few good kicks. All the while she never took her eyes of the woman and her stabbed friend.

The blood, pooled around the man's feet. He staggered back and collapsed, and the woman knelt beside him. Oh god, was this turning into one of those water works soap opera deaths? No this wouldn't do.

Neo opened her umbrella and parried a blade heading for her ribs and redirected it into the ribs of the man in front of her. Then in one smooth motion, she removed the hidden blade from the umbrella, kicked the third attacker in the knee and then slashed the throat of the fourth.

She then danced between them faster than they could react and plunged or swiped the glistening blade of Hush across each of their throats. They all fell at once, with Neo daintily wiping the blood off her blade with a handkerchief she carried.

She looked back to the woman that stabbed her partner. The man was still in the woman's arms, and his blood encircled both of them. Damn it she missed his death. Oh well, she still had the blubbering woman to take care of.

She causally walked over to the sobbing woman, twirling her blade in one hand and holding her umbrella in the other. The woman did not move, did not look at her, she just knelt there sobbing, holding the dead body close to her chest.

This. . .this was unusual. Neo paused right in front of them and examined the two. How could they not notice the tiny terror, not that she was tiny, just fun sized. But still she had a reputation, so why wasn't the woman even bothering with her?

Looking over them, a gleam of light caught her eyes. The woman was holding the dead man's hand, their fingers intertwined and they wore matching rings. Huh, so that explains it. She had made this woman kill her hubby. She obviously cared for the meat sack more than her own life. Why else would she not even get into a defensive stance with Neo so close.

He must have been her whole world. And now Neo had shattered that world. Neo clicked her tongue. This woman would forever be in pain. Not physical pain, maybe emotional pain, but definitely the pain of having an empty void within you.

Neo stepped behind the woman placed the pint of the blade at the base of the woman's neck just above her nape. The woman stiffened for a moment, but seemed to let go with her last breath relaxing ever so slightly.

Neo plunged the blade swiftly through the woman's neck. She instantly severed the woman spinal cord and punctured out through her wind pipe. She died instantly, with the slightest of a smile on her face.

Neo pulled her blade out of the woman and then took the time to lay the woman beside her man. She made sure that the woman's hand never left the man's.

~~00000~~

Neo stood tall and stretched out her back. She put Hush away and straightened her beloved bowler hat. Looking a little down the way she caught a glimpse of Cinder wrapping up her spat with the remaining people. She hurled a fire ball at them burning them to a crisp. One foolish man slashed at her with a long sword. Somehow he managed to connect and tore a chunk of . . .Black flesh from Cinder's bandaged arm.

And instantly the man paid for it as he ignited into an inferno of flames. But the horrifying dying screams of the man did not catch Neo's attention. It was the black tendrils that shot out of Cinder's wound and tried to crawl and whither their way, up her arm. Some reached her shoulder and seemed to embed themselves into her flesh there. They stop when she cauterized the wound though.

Neo walked over to Cinder and gave a "what now" shrug.

Cinder slashed her bandaged hand across the wall creating three parallel angled lines. "We hide the evidence and blame another. Find the computers and wipe all information of us being here."

Neo nodded and headed off to the little watchmen booth. Luckily the computer was left on, so only a little bit if hacking was needed to open up some sealed files and delete video images. While doing this she noticed a report that was being filed, left on the desk. She picked it up and glanced through it. She was thrilled to see little red with a mug shot. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Once she finished deleting all traces of her and Cinder she skipped over to eye patch and waved the file in the air with the biggest grin ever.

Cinder snatched it out of her hands and read through it. "It seems we are not too far behind. This may be easier than I anticipated."

She flipped a few pages glancing over the files. Then she froze. "HOW! How is she still alive? I killed her myself."

Neo danced over and peered around Cinder's arms. The page on the left show a wonderful mug shot of the former S.D.C. heiress. The one on the right showed a straggly blond guy, so it had to have been the heiress Cinder killed.

"Neo. Show me the security footage. Now!" Cindered commanded.

Neo backed away from Cinder. Geez, why has the heiress got Cinder's panties in knots? Hiding a scowl, Neo beckoned Cinder to follow her to the watchman booth. Once there Neo plopped herself down in the office chair and spun it around a full circle before she went hacking into the security feed. Honestly she already had access but if Cinder wanted to be a pain in her butt then she'll take all the sweet time she wanted.

Once the feed was up, she played the snip it from when little red and her gang were brought in. Cinder peered over the top of her chair. The creepy bandaged hand holding firm on the arm rest.

"This cannot be! I killed her. She was there on the ground, a gaping hole in her gut, barely breathing. So why is she still standing?" Cinder bit her lip pondering over how Weiss' survival was even possible.

Cinder watched the footage, trying to pick up on any sign of the heiress's fatal injury, labored breathing, clutching her side, or even a change in her stride, but there was nothing. The heiress moved as if she had never received an injury at all. Her brain whirled, none of this made since, none of it should be possible. Then a boy came on the screen.

Cinder reached over Neo and pause the footage. She stared at tall blond boy. Arc was his name. An annoying little brat that thought sacrificing himself to her would save his friends. He's the reason she even bothered to hurt the heiress. Just to shove it in his face that he was powerless against her.

Last she saw him he was hunched over the heiress pointlessly trying to stop the bleeding of a wound which could not be –

Wait could it be that he had healed her wound? She looked into him during her time at beacon. He was completely useless back then, even Ozpin made note that he didn't have his semblance unlocked, but that the boy was unusually durable with a high recovery rate. Perhaps it was not that his semblance was still locked, just never in a situation to use it on another before. A semblance to heal would be nearly useless mid battle if it required physical contact.

Cinder looked to her bandaged arm. At the threads of blackened Grimm flesh that has been slowly eating away at what remain of her. Each day it spread a little further, consuming her. Every day she fought to ignore the agony it caused her. Salem's power had kept the Apathy like grim arm in check. But if this boy could heal a wound as grieves as the one the heiress had, then her arm and even her eye. She can be whole once more, and finally free from Salem.

"Neo, there's been a slight change in plans." Cinder's smile was cruel and viscous. "We may need to . . . 'make contact' with this Arc boy."

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading my new story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

She was powerful, and strong. Able to make an army of men quiver in fear with a single gaze. So beautiful that both man, and woman would heed her every beck and call.

Again she was.

Cinder cursed Ruby Rose once more under her breath, as she tried to reason with rather annoying inn keeper. "Look if money is an issue I can amend this." She tosses a small pouch of lien onto the counter.

The gruff inn keeper just looked at it and sneered. "Lady I was trying to be nice about it, but now you toss a bag of stolen lien at me," Cinder internally question how the man knew it was dirty money. ". . . Leave right now and I'll even turn a blind eye to this."

Cinder could not fathom why this man was turning her away, but knew when to cut her losses. "Very well I'll take my business elsewhere."

The man snorted and turned back to his ledgers.

Cinder walked out of the inn and into its adjoining alley. She was meant with the sound of glass shattering.

Neo stood behind her, leaning up against the wall with a smug grin peeking out from beneath the brim of a bowler hat. Honestly she looked a little too much like a certain flamboyant annoyance they both knew.

Neo pulled out her scroll and typed out a message**. 'What's the matter hot stuff, the boys aren't biting tonight?'**

"The inn keeper is rather congested, we could easily be spotted. We will find an abandoned building to make use of instead," Cinder said.

Neo grimaced. _"Hell no! After everything I went through in Mistral to get here, I am not giving up the comfort of eating ice cream in bed tonight. I even got a stash of Pink Lemonade ice cream ready too, and I will be eating that tonight. "_

Neo snatched the bag of lien from Cinder, who only blinked at how fast she did that. Neo removed most of the lien and stuffed a few pieces of a shredded box into the bag. She let her hair down and ruffled it a little to give it a messy look and used her perfectly awesome semblance, over active imagination, to change her appearance.

Her messy hair was now a deep black that matched Cinder's and her monochromatic pink and brown eyes have become a dim yellow, something that was a bit brighter than Cinder's deep amber eyes. Her curvy body also changed, it was appeared to be that of a prepubescent child of maybe eight or ten. Her new clothing look also seemed to emphasize the young age as she now had a tattered long sleeve pink shirt, a worn pair of blue jeans, and very childish pink boots.

Neo typed another message out. '**Sit back and watch a pro get this done.'**

Neo took out a small notepad and pen; she clutched them close to her chest with the bag of lien and cardboard and hesitantly walked into the inn.

She stared at the inn keeper for a moment and appeared to be indecisive about what to do. The inn keeper noticed and spoke up. "Hey kid, what's the matter?"

Neo jumped at his words and them quickly made her was to the front desk; she scribbled something on her notepad and then placed it on the counter and pushed it to him. The man raised an eyebrow to this but didn't say much. **"I'm sorry my sister was rude to you."**

The man grunted and Neo snatched her notepad back and wrote a little more. **"I'm sorry she tried to trick you too." **Neo dumped out the contents of her bag of lien and separated the lien from the cardboard on the counter for the man to see.

She pushed over the entire lien she had, which turned out to be exactly twenty-three, and then wrote some more. **"Would this be enough for a room?"**

The man sighed. "Thanks' for apologizing kid, but I just don't rent rooms to faunas. There are a few places that do, I'll write them down for you."

The man turned to get the pen he left with his ledger when he stopped. Neo had reached over the counter to clutch at his shirt sleeve. He looked back and found a big, watering pare of dim yellow eyes and a quivering lip.

_"Yes you fool, break amongst the power of my puppy eyes," _Neo thought.

"Kid, what's wrong?"

Neo move back and scribbled a note. **"Me and my sister aren't faunas, why won't you let us stay?"**

"Kid you say that, but there no way your sister can hide those fauna's claws with mere bandages."

Neo rapidly wrote another message. **"But that's not even her real arm‼" **The man raised a brow at this as Neo wrote some more. **"Me and my sister were attacked by Grimm when our family went to see the Vytal festival. We lost our parents and were both hurt really bad. It's why I cannot talk anymore." **Neo placed one of her hands gently over her throat, where the man finally noticed a large jagged scar there. Neo stared blankly into the counter and trembled. A few tears slid down her cheeks.

"Oh, sorry you had to go through something like that." The man picked up the pile of lien and took three and pushed the twenty into her hand. "You got more than enough to cover a room for the two of you." He coughed trying to not look soft. "Thanks' for clearing up that misunderstanding."

Neo beamed a delightful smile at him. He turned to his ledgers and in spoke to her "You better get you sister in here before she catches a cold." He tossed her keys to a room and she skipped away.

Neo twirled the keys around her finger as she let her semblance fall once she was out of sight. She open one eye and smirked a cocky grin to Cinder, then tossed the keys to her. Neo brought her scroll back out now. **"That's how you do it. By the way our cover is that we're victims of the Vytal festival, our parents died there, and that arm of yours is a cheap prosthetic."**

If this bothered Cinder she didn't let it show. Instead she just nodded. "I cannot argue with results, come let's get some rest tomorrow will be a long day."

* * *

General Iron woods office was not what one would expect from the well-grounded and dutiful man. Sure it was bib, almost as large as Ozpin's old office, with an even better view. But it was a cluttered mess of books, file cabinets, bulletin board, holo-boards, and an entire will filled with monitors. His desk was just as bad as the rest of his office.

"James you're just as disorderly as ever I see," Maria said.

Ironwood made his way to his desk. "It's the best I can do when I have to be a headmaster AND a general. Please have a seat everyone."

The teams of RWBY, ORNJ, Qrow and Maria looked around. Not chairs were in sight, slowly the students began to sit or lean against piles of books or file cabinets around the room.

"Honestly James," Maria spat. "You offer us chairs but don't provide any; I thought I taught you better than that." Maria rubbed her chin in thought. "Perhaps I was too soft on you back them, I did only use one cane on you, and perhaps I should have used two."

Despite all his military training, Ironwood flinched at Maria's words, something Qrow didn't fail to miss.

Qrow nudged yang with his elbow, "Kid, if you're still up for prank's I got one of gold, for James here."

Yang grinned, only person she knew that was better than her at pranks was her uncle, and those were always epic. "Definitely count me in," she whispered.

Ironwood cleared his throat to gather their attention, "Now, would someone like to explain why you are here?"

Ruby spoke up, "Were here to collect the Relics and find the maidens."

Ironwood sat straight in his seat and his face became stern. "Explain. How do you know this, and why you want them?"

Qrow pushed off the wall. "Long story short, Farm-boy here is the new Oz, and told us too. Lionheart turned trader and killed off most of Mistral's Huntsman, Raven is the spring maiden, and there is a new fall maiden out there somewhere. We already got the relic of knowledge, and here's the kicker, Oz once banged Salem, and neglected to tell us she is immortal."

Ironwood sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "It's going to be a long night," he muttered. He looked over the room taking in his options, before speaking. "Miss Rose, I want you and your team to fill me in on everything that's happened since the fall of beacon."

It took a couple hours, but team RWBY was able to fill James in on everything. Ren, kept Nora relatively quiet throughout the conversation, Jaune chipped in occasionally to help out Ruby when she got stuck. Maria sat quietly listening to their tale and only now learning of how much these young children have really been through. Qrow and Oscar chose to remain silent during the whole thing.

"Hmm, I see. Things outside of Atlas are far worse than I first thought." Ironwood looked up to Ruby. "Thank all for bringing this to my attention, if it wasn't for the sensitive nature this situation, I would award each of you a medal and title for your deeds." Team RWBY, and the remaining members of team JNPR's faces brightened at that. "But I am most thankful for providing me with a means to kill Salem and end the war."

Everyone's mood dropped and confusion set it. Qrow marched up to Ironwoods desk, slammed his hands down on to and stared at James. "Don't you dare mess with us like that James. These kids have been through enough as is. They know Salem is immortal, they heard it from the spirit of knowledge directly, so don't be giving them false hope."

James didn't flinch, he didn't waver, and didn't back down from Qrow. He meant Qrow's gaze head on, and in a firm controlling tone simple stated. "I'm not."

A quick thwack, thwack sound echoed throughout the messy office and both James' and Qrow were rubbing the top of their heads as they turned to Maria.

"Qrow, haven't I told you not doubt your niece or her friends? You gravely underestimate them and that will surely be your down fall." Qrow nodded and backed away from the desk. "As for you James, stop being so stubborn, holding on to your beliefs is one thing but letting those beliefs control you is a very dangerous and self-destructive path."

Ironwood took a deep breath and let it out slowly, "I'll take your advice to hear Maria, but I was not lying about being able to kill Salem."

"Explain," Qrow demanded, and Maria shot him a frown.

Ironwood rose from his chair and began to pace around the room. "You said it yourself. Salem was cursed by the god of light to walk this world until she learned the errors of her way. This means her immortality is finite, if proper conditions are meant she will lose her immortality." He spun on his heal to face them all. "She must learn the importance of life and death, of their place in this world."

Yang jumped off the file cabinet she was sitting on. "Hold up, are you telling me you intend to lecture Salem until she dies? If that's all it would take then we should have forced her to take Professor Port's Grimm studies class."

"It's not that easy," Ironwood continued. "Salem is centuries old and her belief has been set in stone since she was first cursed."

"Then how are we supposed to change her mind? Not even Ozpin could do that," Jaune said, almost spatting Ozpin's name.

"That is where the relics come in," James answered. "We use the relic of knowledge to bestow the information of Life and death into Salem. We use the relic of choice to force her to choose to see the wisdom of that knowledge. Use the relic of destruction, to destroy her power and Kingdome, and finally we use the relic creation to rebuild the land the wastelands into something habitable."

"Can it really be that easy?" Ruby asked.

"We do not fully understand how each relic works, and if the others have similar limits like the relic of knowledge does, we will not be able to test them. On top of that we must make sure no single person carries multiple relics. Even if we stop Salem humanity is still divided and I doubt there would be any good judgment passed for that. We want to avoid calling the gods back here at all costs." James looked over everyone, typed out a message and then spoke. "You all have done well to bring, this to my attention. I have arranged rooms for all of you in the guest quarters of Atlas academy. I'll review this information with Winter . . ." Weiss' face lit up at learning her sister was in the know about such things " . . .and see if we could come up with a reasonable plan. We'll run it by all of you first though, all of your experiences with this make you highly qualified and trustworthy enough to remain part of this. Please go and take a break you all have earned it."

With that they made the good byes with Maria complaining about making an old woman take the flights of stairs again.

All of them left besides Jaune, he told them he had a couple questions for ironwood. In truth Jaune received a personal message from the general himself, asking him to stay behind.

"You wanted to speak with me sir?" Jaune asked.

Ironwood nodded and let out a sigh, he seemed to age ten years in doing so. Whatever was on his mind had to be serious. "Jaune, I own you a personal apology."

Jaune blinked, "Sorry I think I still got snow in my ears. I thought you just said you wanted to apologies."

"I did. It is due to my actions that you have lost a member of your team."

Jaune staggered and had to brace himself on a file cabinet to keep from falling over. "W-what, do you mean? Pyrrha, died at the hands of Cinder." He looked to the floor. "Died because I wasn't strong enough to protect her."

Ironwood placed a hand on Jaune's shoulder. "Mr. Ark, you did everything and more within your power to protect her and many more people during the fall of Beacon. I truly wish there were more men like you in this world."

"Thanks' sir," Jaune mumbled.

"Pyrrha Nikos was targeted because she was the Fall maiden." James began.

"What? But the transfer didn't work?"

"It did. I went over the readings when we recovered the aura chambers from the collapsed vault. A small portion of the maiden powers were transferred over to her, I believe this is why Cinder chose to kill her."

"But that's not your fault sir, Ozpin chose Pyrrha to become the fall maiden not you."

"He chose her because I was unable to provide a suitable person for that roll."

Jaune's mouth hung open, he tried to speak but no word came out. So Ironwood explained. "I didn't want to put anyone else in harm's way. I didn't want what happened to Amber to happen to any student of mine or Ozpin's. So I worked with Dr. Polendina. Our goal was to create a synthetic human that the maiden powers could be transferred too."

"You mean Penny?" Jaune questioned.

"Yes, Penny was my choice to be the next fall maiden. But the research was rushed, even though Penny has a core capable of supporting and generating aura, we found it was barely stable. Transferring the maiden powers to her would have resulted in the loss of Amber, Penny, and the Maiden powers."

"For this you have my sympathies and apologies. It was my distracted focus that resulted in the research into penny's capabilities to stagnate and forced Ms. Nikos to take that burden."

Jaune struggled and failed to hold back his tears. Finally someone admitted to making a mistake that cost Pyrrha's life. Someone was acknowledging that did wrong and wanted to make amends. But it was not the person Jaune expected, nor wanted to hear that from.

Jaune stood straight, wiped his tears away and held the general's stare. "Sir you are not at fault for Pyrrha's death. You and me are the same, in that regard. We both went above and beyond to protect the people we cared about. We did everything we could. Pyrrha was a huntress, and she chose to fight, to allow others to have a chance to dream, and make the world a better place."

Jaune took a shuttering breath. "So please sir, don't blame yourself. Instead help us honor our friend and fight with us to protect this world she loved so much."

James smiled. "I truly do wish there were more men like you in this world, Jaune. All right, I will honor Ms. Nikos' and aid you aid your friends in the war against Salem."

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading my new story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.**

**Another note, I would like to apologies for this story chapter being a few day's late. I am going to try to update this story at least once every month of the 14th. **

**Also we have some official cover art for this Story now. It is yuumei's "Under the overpass" you can find it on her web site at yuumei .com. **

**I chose this image first because, I love her work and I plan to have her work featured on every story I post. the second reason is that I felt like the melancholy and sadness, yet also piece and love in that image, it reminded me of how both Jaune and Neo are suffering through grief and that they have each other to lean on for support. Oop's didn't mean to spoil, but come on, at this point everyone already knew this was going to be a Silent Knight ship.**


	3. Chapter 3

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

After a good and unexpected hug and farewell from the general, he was led by an assistant to the Atlas dormitories where he was told his team would be at after their own tour ended. Jaune was thankful that the assistant didn't talk much and simple briefly mentioned the important places on their way to the dorms. It gave Jaune some time to think, and cool his head. Once he got to his dorm the assistant left and with a sigh Jaune tried to put on a smile for his friends before opening the door.

What he found inside, rattled him to his core. His breath froze in his lungs and his heart raced. His eyes set onto the locks of long bright red hair and emerald green eyes full of life. Just like that all the resolve he had built up on his way to the dorm was shattered.

"Pyrrha . . . "He unconsciously muttered out.

"Oh you must be Jaune Arc! Ruby's first boy friend! Sorry you cannot be my first boy friend too, that place has been reserved by Ren." Was Pyrrha's voice always so giddy? Jaune blankly questioned as he struggled to find the words he wanted to tell her.

"HEY! He is -" an annoyed Nora tried to say only to be interrupted by Penny.

Jaune remained motionless as the redhead rushed to him and grabbed his hand shaking it wildly, good thing he was used to Nora's handshakes or else his shoulder might have dislocated. The jostling pulled him a little back to reality. There standing before him, was Penny. The android he swore was killed during the Vytal festival.

_"That's right Pyrrha's gone." _He reminded himself_. _A tear slowly traced his cheek. An image of Pyrrha's kind smile filling his mind and vision as it tune out the world for him. It twisted to one of pain and heart ache as she burnt up before his eyes. Her flesh sizzling and charring it burned her like a Yule log on a fire turning her to dust.

His hand instinctively tightened on Penny's she smiled and returned his hand shake with more gusto.

Ozpin's beady brown eyes and silver hair flashed before him. "Keep them safe during the transfer." He ordered. No sooner were the words done echoing around Jaune's mind did an arrow fly past him and the eyes of the ill Fall maiden went wide. She struggled to breath and looked to Jaune. Their eyes looked and he felt her begging him to save her. Those eyes went dull a moment later head slumped.

The chamber and the Maiden shattered like glass, Pyrrha stood before him once more. A door slammed close between the two of them. "I love you," she says through the slats, only to go up in another inferno of fire.

_"I was weak."_

"You think you're strong enough to save them? Don't be foolish boy. You cannot save any of them" Cinder's voice rang though his head.

He stumbled forward, and out of his trance when Penny unintentionally pulled his arm when she turned around, still shaking his hand. ". . . heard some many stories about you from Ruby, that I. . ." Penny was cut off as Jaune willed himself to speak.

"Penny?" He all but whispered his voice horse. "But . . . but how? I thought . . . you were . . . how are you even here?"

Penny smiled and it looked like she tried to chuckle but it came out as a strange soft cackle. "Oh friend Jaune worry not. I was not dead, just something similar to being a critical condition comatose patient."

_"Oh she never died, just badly injured. That's good. Why couldn't that have been Pyrrha?" _ He swallowed the harsh acidic taste welling up in the back of his throat. _"Why would I even want that? Penny was just as innocent in all of this as Pyrrha was. But Pyrrha was the one I loved." _Jaune's stomach knotted over on itself.

"But luckily my core was not damaged so my father transplanted it and thus woke me from my coma. But now I truly hope you may be my second best boy friend!" Penny beamed a bright smile and her emerald eyes seemed to shine with life and joy.

Jaune broke eye contact. Something she didn't seem to mind. _'Why couldn't those be Pyrrha's eyes I stared into? Why is Penny here and not her! Her injury should have killed her. It would have it she was normal human."_

"I must say your leadership skill and tactical abilities are most astounding." Penny went on not noting his discomfort, but the others have and gave him a troubled look.

_"Why do you look at me like that? I lost everything! Shouldn't I have the right to look like this? I'm not weak!" _Jaune grimaced.

"You cannot save anyone." Cinder's voice rang as the nameless Hunter in the village of Shion dies in his arms.

_"I am week and others have pied for it."_

An excited squeal from Penny pulled him from his thoughts. "I will love to be working alongside you Friend Jaune. I have re-watched your Vytal tournament team battle 176 times to learn from you. Ah! I almost forgot." Penny's voice and demeanor suddenly changing to a softer and sorrowful tone, even the hand she was roughly shaking was now gently clasped between both her hands. "I am sorry for the loss of your teammate Pyrrha Nikos. I was not fortunate enough to know her off the battle field, but I could tell she was an honorable and caring warrior. Before I went into my coma I saw how sad my injuries made her. I know she never meant to do that to me. It was an accident and I don't hold any ill intent to her. In that brief moment I knew she cared and it made me wish she truly was my friend too."

Jaune looked away trying hard to hide his tears that streamed down his face like a torrent of nonstop waves. "Thank you Penny," he muttered between sobs. "She would have really liked you as a friend too."

The room went quite for a moment as everyone hung their heads. After a moment Nora finally took the opportunity to speak up. "Finally‼ Robot Girl finally stopped talking! Now am I the only one that is like totally confused as to why Ironwood came up with an awesome plan, like only two minutes after learning everything?" Nora flared her arms to make her emphasize her point. "We knew all that stuff for week's now‼ Did anyone else really not see Salem's weakness? I mean as your queen I could have done that too, but without my daily pancake fuel my brain never hand the energy to be so awesome."

_"If Ironwood only knew back then, would she still be here?" _

Everyone in the room, except Jaune who was lost in his own thoughts, went stiff, Nora just blurted out highly classified information with Penny right there. They all turned to look at the robotic girl. Penny just blinked before turning to face the rest of them. "Oh are all of you aware of the Grimm queen as well? That saves me quite a bit of trouble since I will no longer need to lie about any future missions I am sent on regarding that matter. I have been told I have an obvious tell to when I am lying."

Everyone was just dumbfounded, many of them suddenly suffering from slack jaw. Qrow pushed off the wall and stepped forward. "Kid how do you know this?"

Penny looked at Qrow for a moment wondering why he carried such a serious air about him all of a sudden. "How, Because Ironwood has entrusted that information to me."

_"Why weren't we trusted?" _Jaune thought.

"Right . . .?" Qrow said with a raised brow. "How many others know of this?"

"Aside from myself, Specialist Winter, General Ironwood and all of you, there is also his elite guard. It was the five individuals that actually brought all of you into custody."

Qrow sighed and walked back to his corner. "At least James is keeping his cards close to him," he mumbled.

Jaune spoke up from behind Penny; it was quite and broken. "Penny were you aware that you were supposed to the original fall maiden?"

Again most of everyone on the room suddenly suffered from slack jaw. "Gees! How many shockers are we going to get on one day?" Nora said exasperated.

Penny frowned. "Yes, I knew. Though it was highly classified during the Vytal festival and back then I was never briefed on the entire project due to Ozpin's request for neutrality of possible candidates interacting with each other, it was later, after I woke that I was told the whole story as well as the who was the other candidate. It seems with Ozpin's passing the restriction was lifted."

_"Ozpin even kept Penny from knowing the whole truth. She could have helped Pyrrha."_

Ruby took a cautious step forward she did not like the dark and cold look that was slowly consuming her friends face. "Jaune, what's this about, Penny and other candidates, being a maiden?"

Jaune was silent and did not even look to Ruby; he held his blank and distant eyes on Penny. _"Her vary purpose of being made was to be a maiden, and Ozpin forced her into ignorance!"_

Penny was the first to break eye contact and spoke. "I was created to become the successor of the previous Fall maiden, Amber. But it was found that my core would not be stable with the addition of a second aura as such I am unable to become a maiden." Penny held her head down ashamed that she could not fulfill her purpose.

Ren spoke the question that was on most peoples mind. "I don't mean to be rude Penny but why would you need to have two auras to become a maiden? The power, not the aura, is simply passed to the last female in the thoughts of the dying maiden."

Jaune's voice cut the air, they were fragile and weak. "Atlas had a machine that could transfer a person's aura to someone else." This shocked most of them but with everything that happened; their senses were a bit dulled with shock for this day. "The machine was supposed to forcibly transfer Amber's aura and with it her maiden powers to Penny. But since, penny wasn't able to Ozpin chose Pyrrha." Jaune glared at Oscar his words becoming sharp and heated.

Nora looked around and in a cheerful voice stated. "Wait Pyrrha was a maiden? Awesome! So like we actually had a superhero on our team that whole time? Why didn't she ever tell us? I would have totally kept her secret identity a secret."

Her attempt to lighten to mode failed big time as Jaune pushed passed Penny and slowly started walking over to Oscar. "She didn't tell us because she didn't know until the Vytal festival already started. And even the she was never given the full story. Isn't that right Ozpin?"

_"She was forced into ignorance by HIM as well, forced to die because of him."_

He looked over the rest of the rooms occupants, all of them were tense, before he turned back to Oscar. "Ozpin forced her into a corner. He told her she was the only one qualified, and that if she refused one of her friends would be chosen instead and if she told any of us we would be in danger."

Oscar had backed up into the far wall. Jaune was still halfway across the room from him be he didn't want to be anywhere near Jaune right now.

_"Ozpin kept this from everyone. He let the attack on Amity happen; he was so sure he could handle it. He let everything go to ruin to keep his secrets."_

"He ONLY told her what he wanted so she would think she had a choice in becoming the next fall maiden." He gave a low deep chuckle. "And it worked. After the attack on the Amity Pyrrha had a portion of the maiden powers transferred to her. And Cinder killed her for it!" Jaune took a deep sharp breath. "Pyrrha didn't know. She never knew what we know." He flung has arm out to the side. His hand smashed into a nightstand shattering the corner and making it lean to one side. Everyone stared at Jaune; he didn't even realize what he just did. "She only knew about the maidens. She never knew the whole story. If she had known about Penny, If she knew about the whole truth: about the secret war, about Salem, about you, she would have made a better choice." With each accusation Jaune's voice grew stronger and fiercer. "Why! Why did you not tell us?"

Everyone was standing now, forming a slight circle around Jaune with Yang and Nora between him and Oscar.

"We could have planned things out," he took a step closer, "and been there too support Pyrrha when you first told her." He gripped his head in his hands, pulling at his hair brimming with anger and frustration. "If you told Ironwood earlier he might have proposed his plan ages ago! Why can't you just fess up and admit you messed up‼" He screeched at Ozpin.

"Kid calm down this isn't helping anything." Qrow placed a hand on Jaune's shoulder trying to snap him out of his anger. What no one expect was for Qrow to go flying through the air crashing into Penny and then both of the crashing through the door and into the hall way. The rest stared at Jaune and took out their weapons. It looked like Jaune just casually shrugged Qrow off; yet to send the huntsman through the door like that meant Jaune had his aura and semblance maxed to enhance his physical strength.

Jaune stood there trembling and heaving for air. One hand still gripped his head and hair tightly the other just hung limply at his side.

Oscar trembled looking back and forth between the downed Qrow and Jaune. He took a deep breath and decided he had to admit for the mistake that would soon become his own. If he didn't do it now, he might never get the chance to or have the mind to do so. Oscar walked passed Yang and Nora giving them a reassuring nod. He reached out to put a hand on Jaune's trembling shoulder. "I'm sorry‼ I'm sorry Jaune! I messed up. I—"

A voice reached Jaune through his haze. It was familiar; it was one that causes him pain and loss. Ozpin was talking to him. He glared up with one eye. A hand with a green glove was closing in on him. _"No Don't get near me. Don't trap me with your words like you did to her."_ The hand touched his shoulder. The ominous aura, that ancient aura filled with countless lies and deceit, filled with darkness that rivaled the grim he killed every day met with his own aura. _"No! He won't get his way, and trap me. I cannot shame Pyrrha by letting him do that to me!" _

Oscar's words were cut off as Jaune shoved his hand off and charged forward with him in hand. Jaune effortlessly bowled through Yang and Nora pinning Oscar up against a wall. "NO!" Jaune's eyes trembled as he stared into Oscar's orange ones. "I want to hear it from Ozpin! Not his shadow."

Ren and Blake grabbed Jaune's arm's trying to pull him off of Oscar, but he didn't pay them any attention. Jaune just flared the aura in his arms to get them off. Ren and Blake snatched their hands back. Their palms were bright red with a mild burn that almost blistered. Oscar was not as lucky as he screamed in pain, his neck and torso being scolded from the arms that held him.

"Come on Ozpin! Why can't you say it?!" Jaune pulled Oscar off the wall and pushed him back into it. The wall behind Oscar caved inward a little with him at the center of a spider web of cracks. Oscar's gasped as the air left his lungs. "Even Ironwood admitted his mistake!" He threw a punch into the wall beside Oscar's head. "He apologized for it! So. Why. Can't. You. Do. That!" With each word he threw another punch into the wall.

Ruby tried to hook him with her scythe but as it came around he batted it away like it was a fly. The force was strong enough to knock it clean out of Ruby's hands and lodged the blade into the wall.

"I'm trying Jaune, I can't bring him out." Oscar gasped as Jaune's grip tightened.

Jaune slammed Oscar into the wall again. "Stop hiding and fess up already‼"

"Stop, please he won't listen to me, Jaune I'm sorry," Oscar pleaded.

"Not you!" Jaune said throwing Oscar down onto the floor. "I don't want to hear your shadow speak for you. Get out here and say it yourself!" Jaune stood there still for a moment and everyone froze not sure what he was going to do next. "You came out when Oscar was about to crash and die in that bullhead. If that's the kind of incentive you need to show yourself then I'll give it‼" Jaune knelt down and pulled his fist back.

Weiss threw up her repulsion glyph, placing it right between Jaune and Oscar. Jaune just punched right through it unfazed by the attempt to stop him. Jaune's fist meant Oscar's side and there was a sickening sound of bone cracking. A second fist landed right after the first right into Oscar's gut. All the air left his lungs as he hacked out a wad of blood.

Ruby was trying to pull her scythe from the wall when she heard the cracking of bone, she spun around and gasped at the sight. She looked over her teammates: Yang, Nora, and Qrow were only now recovering from Jaune's accidental attacks and still a little dazed, while Ren and Blake were trying to patch up each other's burns.

Oscar gurgled through a mouth full of blood trying his hardest to stay conscious. "I'm . . . s-sorry"

"Not you‼ Ozpin‼ Say you messed up‼ Come out here and say it‼" Jaune stated to ruthlessly pound Oscar into the floor. A crater slowly forming beneath them with every hit Jaune placed. The floor threatened to give away at any moment. _"It's your fault! Vale fell because of you‼ Beacon destroyed by your hand. Amber died from your mistakes. Pyrrha died from your pride! Your stupid stupid pride!"_ Pain, anger, and hatred filled Jaune's mind. Hatred for the man that thought it was fine to toy with his life. Hatred for the man that thought it was a game and tossed Pyrrha away. Hatred for the man, that took everything away from him. That man should suffer. Suffer by his hand, like he had suffered under his.

"Penny!" Ruby shrieked. "Restrain Jaune now‼" She turned to Ren. "Ren, your semblance. Go!"

Penny snapped herself to attention from her sprawled out position on the floor, Qrow was surprisingly heavy and had knocked the air out of her, even though she technically didn't have any in her. She charged forward and tackled Jaune off Oscar. Both crashed into a nearby wall leaving another crater. Jaune struggled in Penny's grasp his strength enough to have Penny's motors audibly squeal. His aura flared strong enough to ignite portions of Penny's cloths. When Ren tried to place a hand on Jaune he fell back with a scream. Nora jumped to his side and looked at Ren's hand. Portions of the flesh on his fingers were burnt black. "I cannot get close enough to use my semblance!"

Ruby looked to Penny, her face locked into a grimace as she struggled to hold Jaune down and her false skin was started to melt away. Juane's eyes were clouded over with rage and locked on Oscar's still body. Ruby scooped up the unconscious Oscar and dart to the doorway. "Everyone stall Jaune, Penny disengage, and get me to the medic ASAP." Ruby dashed off into the hallway. Penny released Jaune who was momentarily tackled by everyone else, giving penny just enough time to fly off after Ruby. Jaune flared his semblance and forced himself out of the pile of bodies. A shotgun punch to his temple sent him into the wall.

He shrugged it off and charged forward. His eyes locked on the door, and empty hallway.

_"No! I'm not finished with Oz yet!" _he internally screamed.

He bowled through all of them again and parried an attack from Qrow, which stunned the man. He was about to throw an attack of his own when he froze.

"Just keep practicing Jaune, and remember your basics." Pyrrha's voice filled the room as everyone fell silent. "Jaune... I... I... I want you to know that I am happy to be a part of your life. I'll always be here for you, Jaune"

Jaune slowly turned, toward the sound and slowly walked towards it. Blake flinched at first but held out his scroll, which played the training video Pyrrha had made him. He took the scroll from her and stared at it as it automatically started to replay the video. Ren took a step forward and reached for Jaune's shoulder. The boy side stepped out if Ren's reach. "No Ren. I'm sorry but I . . . I need these feelings right now. I can't move forward if I never face them."

He watched Ren backed away and into the very worried embrace of Nora who for the first time ever looked at Jaune as if he was something worse than the Nucklave they faced. It took a moment for Jaune to place Nora's expression but he did. She feared him. She actually feared for herself and Ren's well-being because of him. Jaune backed away from his teammates and looked over everyone else. They were all beaten, bruised, burned, and in general states of dishevelment. "I . . . I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I . . ." None of them would approach him; even Qrow kept a safe distance and still has his weapon out. "I . . . I need to go." He slowly backed away towards the door and everyone in the room changed their stance to pounce on him in a moment's notice. "I'm not going after Oscar, I swear. Just going to get some fresh air. Promise."

No one made a move as he backed away into the doorway. He then ran away as fast as he can in the opposite direction of where Ruby went. The rest darted to the door to chase after him. But with his semblance enhanced aura pumping into his legs he was much faster than Blake and the rest and was soon out of their sights.

Maria waddled up to them in the middle of the hallway and looked them over the panting and disheveled group with a sigh. "I let you youngsters out of my sights for a minute and you get into trouble." She turned around and headed down the hallway to their dorms. "Come on now and fill me in on what I missed."

* * *

Neo gave a deadpan expression across the room to Cinder. Her night was going so well too: she got to relieve some stress, upstage Cinder in getting a room, and now sat in a decent, though not great, bed with a very large bowl of Pink Lemonade ice cream. But Cinder had to ruin it with her idiocy.

Cinder gave Neo her charming smile and waved her hand dismissively. "What, the most successful plans are the most simplistic as well."

Neo couldn't really argue that. Simple means less stuff to mess up, though Roman would have scoffed and mentioned the necessity of flare, that she could agree with more. It made the simple boring plans into simple fun plans. Neo held up her screen to Cinder. **"You want to wait out the brats, ambush and kill them, then kidnap the scraggly kid. We both know they're with Ironwood right now and would most likely be staying at the Atlas school now too."**

"A minor hiccup but nothing that cannot be dealt with," Cinder mused.

**"Your hiccup is going to have us facing off against another huntsman academy if we make a single mistake. You may have those crazy powers but an army could still take you down and these guys are not like Vale. They're trained to attack people too."**

"Neo my darling you simple cannot comprehend how powerful the maiden abilities are. Don't trouble yourself with foolish scenarios like that and leave the planning to me." Cinder threw the covers of her bed and laid her head down to sleep. She was meant with a pillow to the face. Cinder jolted up and glared at Neo.

**"Must I remind you that Red did all that to you? A skilled huntress wannabe that is no larger than me and far weaker than me crippled you when you were at your strongest. Face it Cindy, you're weak and your old methods of doing things won't work this time around. If they did you wouldn't be here or needing me right now."**

Cinder's eye blazed as fire licked about the corners. "You insolent, piece of scum. You only live right now because I allow it. We both want the Rose so follow orders and we'll get our vengeance. Be useful this time and listen, unlike that pitiful excuse of a thief-"

Cinder went silent as the tip of a sword tickled her neck. A half emptied bowl of ice cream rolled on the floor sloshing out and staining the motel carpet. The sword did not move or falter as cinder began to apply heat casing it to glow a bright orange and even the handle began to smoke.

Neo flexed her fingers about the grip of her sword to adjust to the new found heat of her sword. Her eyes a pail cream white bore down into Cinder's with all the vile intensity she could summon. She has literally killed with this stare alone. It would cause such fear that her victims would suffer from heart attacks. She rarely used, only when Roman was in serious danger against another opponent. With her eyes never leaving Cinders she typed out a message with her free hand and held it up.

**"Never insult Roman. Do it again and you'll lose your head before Red loses hers."**

Cinder closed her eyes and sighed as if she was tired from dealing with a troublesome child. She gave a slight nod and after a moment of hesitation Neo removed her sword and hopped over to her own bed. Neo frowned at the empty bowl she picked up from the floor.

"Tell me, if my plan is so flawed," Cinder began. "Then what needs to be addressed in ordered to fix it?" She grinned, a devilish smile certain she had the tricolored girl in her grasp.

Neo rolled her eyes and typed out her response. **"First of all you're weak. Get stronger and stop relying on those powers. If you cannot beat me without those powers then you're weak and won't stand a chance against Red, not to mention whoever banged you up before I found you." **Cinder sneered remembering the battle against Raven. **"Second we need Intel, find their weaknesses, and stay off your old associates' radar. I also think it's better to pick off Red's gang. Start with those most troublesome. Probably get to Blondie early. If the kids a healer then he'll be trouble later on."**

Cinder didn't say anything. Neo had a pretty solid argument. So instead Cinder just rolled over and pretended to sleep. Neo let out a silent exasperated sigh. She put on her coat and hat and was heading for the door when she paused, typed out a message and shoved the scroll into Cinder's face.

**"Going out to get more ice cream, don't burn the place down while I'm gone."**

If Neo's childish regard of Cinder offended her she didn't show it. She just rolled over and ignored her.

* * *

Jaune ran. _"Why did I do that?"_ He ran down flights of stairs, and long empty hallways._ "How could I even think of hurting my friends?"_ He ran past startled custodians and though large doors. He stopped at a light post and leaned on it. _"I did hurt them though. I did it and didn't even know I did." _He pushed off the lamp post and began aimlessly walking the streets. Lost in his thoughts and sorrow he didn't notice the shadow that tailed not far behind him.

* * *

Neo walked along the Atlas streets. She chose to hear her permit disguise tonight. It gave her a more toned and tougher look than her regular self and blended in a bit more with the pastel colors of the ritzier atlas streets. _"Dang how hard is it to find a 24 hour convenient store around here. A girl needs her ice cream," _Neo internally screamed.

"Come on kid we can do this the easy way or the hard way take your pick."

Neo paused and back tracked a bit. She peered down into a dark alley. There was a gang of ten or so thugs. All seemed armed though none had their weapons drawn yet. They're hassling a single person. _"Strange you don't normally need that many thugs for a mugging." _Neo grinned. _"At least I found some entertainment."_ Neo crouched down behind a nearby dumpster and watched.

"And why would I even bother to go with a bunch of losers like you?" The boy shot back.

"This is why." The man held up a small rod with a single red button on top. "If you don't we drop a mine on whoever's in it."

"What the HELL!?" The boy took a step forward and all the men reached for their weapons. "Why are you willing to kill a bunch of people just to get me?"

"Dang kid, are you a moron?" The thugs laughed at that. "You got ties to the big guys. Get you and we can make any demand we want."

"What? That doesn't even make since. You got a whole mine you can use, wait on second thought don't use it. Just put that thing down all right?"

_"This kid's stupid got still gots some sense. He's witty too so that's a plus." _Neo thought.

"You really think the bog dogs are going to care about a stupid mine? Only dumb hero types like you would care about those animals." The lead thug chuckled.

"They're not animals!" the boy howled.

"Now, now, let's be reasonable here Jaune Arc." The boy flinched; he wasn't expecting them to know who he was.

Neo's eyes went wide. _"That's Blondie? I wasn't expecting to find him so soon, or in such a situation. Dang who do I root for? Blondie since I need him or this thug? He almost reminds me of a makeshift Roman. He certainly has a way with words," _she pondered.

The lead thug grinned, a confidant smile. "Yes that's right we know who you are and the hot water you're in right now. Let's not get your hands any dirtier than they already are." He waved the detonator teasingly.

"If you know who I am, then you know I could take you all down easily right?" Jaune got into a fighting stance.

"Ah Ah Ah." The thug waved a finger at him. "Don't be stupid. If you do you'll have the blood of countless animals on your hands." The thugs grin tuned maniacal. "Just like the blood of your carrot top girlfriend. You'll be useless to save them just like her."

Jaune staggered back and stared at the lead thug. Flashes of Pyrrha pushing him into a locker and sending him off flashed before his eyes.

"Grab him, he won't do anything now," as ordered two thugs clasped onto Jaune's arms.

Neo scowled _"Scratch that, I'm rooting for Blondie. Even Roman knew not to toy with people's loss. I'm definitely going to have a word with that thug if he's still breathing after this."_ Neo was about to jump out and handle things when a roar froze her in her track.

Jaune shouted from the top of his lungs flaring his aura. It was so bright Neo had to shield her eyes or risk going blind. She peaked though her fingers and found the two men closest to Blondie rolling on the pavement in screaming in agony. The others, besides the boss who was smart enough to shield his eyes, were all dazed and staggering about.

Jaune took the opening for what it was. He charged the two closest still standing thugs. Landed a fist in the chest of the first throwing him out of the alley. I left hook to the one beside him sending him into a wall unconscious. He grabbed the third by the collar and spun around hurling the thug into a pair across from him. Finally the other two caught their barring and charged him.

He parried a sword with the palm of his hand and caught the shaft of a mace on his other arm. When the sword came back around Jaune grabbed the thug with the mace and pulled him into the path of the sword. The sword thug froze at the sight of his gutted comrade before pushing the man aside, only to find a fist flying straight for his nose. The sword thug flew into a wall and slumped to the ground.

Jaune paused for a moment to catch his breath, glaring at the thug boss.

"Ah Ah Ah!" The man held up the detonator and pressed the button it started blinking red. Jaune charged the guy furious but the thug just side stepped. "Listen kid this is a dead man's switch. As long as I keep my thumb here your precious animals will live."

Jaune froze in his steeps and looked between the man and the detonator. A white trench coat with red trim darted past him and to the thug. "Huh? Wait!" Jaune called to the new comer.

The person jumped up and wrapped their legs around the thug's neck, effectively sitting on the guys shoulders. The person through a couple punches into the thugs face earning a few grunts of pain. The person then back flipped off and snatched the detonator away. Jaune gasped for a moment but the person held their thumb over the trigger making sure it was never released. "_Whoever this was, is a professional for sure,"_ Jaune thought.

The person then swept the thugs leg as the landed and then knocked the thug out with a kick to the face with a bright red stiletto combat boot. _"What kind of combat boot is also a stiletto? Maybe it's a shoe that both Weiss and Ruby would like?" _That thought was rushed out of his mind as the woman, yes it was a woman, no way to miss that with the curves the bright red halter top and white jeans that hugged her body showed off, started to disassemble the detonator.

The blinking stopped and she dropped it to the ground shaking her head.

"Are you insane?" Jaune shrieked dashing to the little woman and lifting her up be the collar of her jacket. He held her up against the wall. "You just dropped a freaken mine on a bunch of innocent faunas!"

Neo held up he hands palm's forward. She waited for him to glance at them before moving them again She lifted her chin up very slowly pointed with one hand to the jagged scar that ran across her throat and down part of her collarbone. After he glanced at it and his face instinctively grimaced she slowly moved her other hand to her pocket. Jaune kept glancing at it never really took his eyes off her. _"The kids smart, he hasn't let his guard done once. Though it's a clumsy guard it's still smart none the less." _Neo thought.

She held up her scroll and Jaune glanced to it with a nod. She smiled and typed out a message. **"Detonator was a fake, nothing more than a small flashlight with a red bulb. Check it yourself. There's no transmitter in it at all and no internal components to say it was linked to any other devices either."**

Jaune glanced at the discarded detonator. "How do I know you're not tricking me too?"

_"He may not be a moron after all."_ Neo typed out another message. **"Look if you don't trust me take my umbrella, it's me weapon, with you and see for yourself. I won't leave this spot when you let me go."**

Making sure she couldn't move he reached down and took the umbrella off of the woman's belt. He glanced at it and pressed the trigger making sure it pointed away from him and the woman. The handled extended a bit and he was meant with the glint of a sword. He adjusted his grip on the handle and flung it to the side. The jerking motion flung the rest of the umbrella across the other side of the alley away from both of them.

He slowly lowered her until her feet were on the pavement. He backed away making sure to keep the tip of her sword pointed at her throat. She just smiled at him and kept her hands held up beside her head. He crouched a bit, picked up the detonator and looked at it, then lowered the sword. "Sorry about that. I had a rather rough day." Jaune picked up her umbrella and sheathed the blade. Neo made note that he never once completely turned his back on her always is keeping her in his sights. _"He is certainly better than what I've seen from the festival. What has he been through to cause such a change in ability." _Neo wondered.

Neo typed out a message and accepted her red and white stripped umbrella back. **"Understandable, those guys did just try to kidnap and blackmail you. Name's Peppermint. Patty Peppermint. But you could just call me Pep."**

Jaune's eyes narrowed. "Hold up. You knew the blackmailed me and wanted to kidnap me." Jaune got into a defensive stance and inched closer to the alley's exit. "Why are you here?"

Neo roller he eyes and typed a message. **"I caught the tail end of the thugs rant when I passed by. Was going to help but you beat me to the punch. Latterly."**

Juan didn't seem to take that seriously. His stance lessened slightly but he took another step closer to the exit. "All right Pep, thanks for the help. But I think I should be going now." He started to back out of the alley.

Frantically Neo typed another message and held up the screen. **"Wait. Before you go I just wanted to say. Sorry for your loss. Losing someone is terrible and that scum should have never used that against you. I'm sorry you had to go through him tarnishing that person."** Neo tried to hold a straight face, but Roman's smile flashed in her mind followed by Cinder's words insulting him.

Jaune read the message and his shoulders dropped. He looked at the Pep. Her face still and hardened, much like he had done to hide his pain from his teammates, but a lone tear made its way down her cheek. Jaune sighed and stood straight. "Heh, would you mine. I don't know getting a soda or something together?"

Neo tilted her head a little confused _"eh, is he asking me out?"_

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading my new story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.**

**Side note. With the upcoming holiday and my semester coming to a close I would most likely not be able to update this story for a while. So don't expect to see another chapter until mid to late December.**


	4. Chapter 4

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

Neo and Jaune stood there in alley entrance. He shuffled back and forth on his feet as he waited for her answer. _"Of course a trained huntress wouldn't even want to hang out with a dork like me, what was I even thinking!" _He chastised himself.

Neo typed out a quick response and held up her scroll. **"Make it ice cream and you got yourself a deal."**

Jaune gave a lopsided grin; glad she was at least letting him thank her. "No problem ice cream it is." Jaune scratched the back of his head. "You wouldn't know where an ice cream place is, would you? I'm kind of new here."

Neo shook her head with a sigh and help up her scroll. **"If I knew, I wouldn't be asking a random guy to take me to one." **

"Right, good point. Well I think I passed a few shops coming this way, or was it that way?"

Neo wiped a hand down her face when his back was turned. _"Scratch that this kid is a moron" _

Jaune suddenly stood tall and his face lit up. _"Geez, this kid really is an open book. This might be way too easy." _Neo thought.

"I know, Snow Angel . . . eh. . . . I mean my friend Weiss, should know a good place for ice cream." Jaune took out his scroll and was about to send a message but paused and frowned. "On second thought maybe I shouldn't. Things were not . . . good when I left."

Neo rolled her eyes and snatched his scroll from him, then held hers up. **"Don't be a baby. If you got a problem face it like a woman. It'll never get solved if you don't address it."**

With that Neo wrote out and sent a message on Jaune's scroll before tossing it back to him. He fumbled and fell over trying to catch it. He glared at Pep from the ground before reading the message she sent. **"Hey Snow Angel, need directions to the closest, open ice cream shop ASAP. I got a hot huntress that needs to be cooled down more than your finely chilled rear end."**

Jaune's Face turned bright red as he shot up and pointed to the screen. "Pep! What in Ohm's name is this?"

Neo showed him her scroll. **"Me giving you a starting point for fixing your problems."** No sooner was he finished reading Neo's scroll did his flare up with a series of dings. Jaune slumped, dreading the messages he was receiving. **"Also you look hysterical, totally worth it."** He glared at Pep after reading that.

Jaune sighed and looked at his scroll. He was surprised to find that all the messages came from Weiss. "All right?"

**Snow Angel: How dare you! Do you even know how furious I am at you right now! You injured several of our friends, and put Oscar in the hospital. And you have the never to message me about ICE CREAM! Without a single thought of an apology. You should be great full that I am**

**Snow Angel: U better have 500 pankakes and burn medicin 4 whn U get back. I MIGHT not break your legs if you do! Still breaking your legs!**

**Snow Angel: It's Ren here. Sorry Jaune, Nora took Weiss' scroll. My burns are not that bad, there were treated here at the Atlas medical wing. The others have been treated as well. Other than Oscar, no one had any serious injuries.**

**Snow Angel: U still oh me PANKAKES‼‼ :C**

**Snow Angel: Yo Vomit boy, what in ohm's name is wrong with you. You totly flipped on us. Your lucky you didn't hurt Rubes, or I'll be hunting you down right now. You got Oscar on life support here. You and me gotta settle things in the ring though. You burnt my partner, so be prepaird to feel the Yang of my flames. **

**Snow Angel: Insufferable dolts all of them. And you! Don't call me snow angel! And stop talking about my rear!**

Jaune looked up at Pep, his face was tired and seemed to droop. "You have no clue what you just got me into." Neo gave a silent chuckle.

Jaune typed a quick message apologizing and explain things to them then pocketed his scroll. "Well I think asking Weiss won't get us anywhere."

Neo was in the middle of typing her response when he got another message. **Snow Angel: Caramel's Parlor, it's a few blocks west of Atlas school. It's the least I could do for the huntress that has to put up with you.**

**Snow Angel: Pancakes or else Mr. ≫:C**

"On second thought she pulled through, there's an ice cream parlor near the school." Jaune pocketed his scroll making several mental notes to pick up pancake batter on his way back.

**"Finally. Lead the way, hero."**

Jaune turned to face the alley entrance only to be meant with a small crowd of passer-byres. An Atlisian beat cop pushed his way through the crowd. He looked over the scene and took out his clipboard and pen. "Sir, can you tell me exactly what happened here?"

Jaune looked back at Pep, she shrugged and pointed to her mouth. Jaune hung his head with a sigh. "Sure officer. Where would you like me to start?"

It took almost an hour to sort out the whole police thing, Neo was just glad Jaune was able to handle it all. She didn't need the cops spotting her so early on. Once they were dismissed Neo followed Jaune to the ice cream parlor in silence. She didn't mind it, in fact she preferred it. Dealing with Cinder and then the Blond Hero's idiocy, and then the police, she really needed the ice cream to stop her oncoming head ache. At least he didn't make it worse by talking.

* * *

Nora paced around the medical word. "I cannot believe Jaune would hurt Renny! No. Jaune would never hurt Ren." She looked over to her partner. "Right Ren?" Ren opened his mouth to answer but couldn't get a word in as Nora went right back to pacing. "Of course he wouldn't. He wouldn't hurt us we're like family to him." An uncharacteristic frown crept across Nora's face. When she turned to her dear Renny, her voice was strained and she choked back tears. "Renny, we didn't have family for a really really long time. Jaune is well like our brother we never had. But . . ." She struggled to even say the words. Ren stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into a comforting hug as he stroked a hand through her bright orange heir. "Lie, are we family to him?" Nora could not help herself, as she let her tears fall onto Ren's shoulder.

This was bad, real bad. Nora never used his first name unless something was really bothering her. Ren held her a little tighter. He honestly didn't know what to tell her. Jaune was obviously very hurt, a deep seeded pain that Ren doubted even his semblance could subdue. Even so, Jaune normally would never do such a thing, not to a stranger and definitely not to those he cared about. So what did Jaune's actions really mean? It was something Ren would need to meditate on for a while, but right now Nora needed him. "Nora, there's no doubt in my mind that Jaune sees us as family." He hated lying to Nora, he really did, but see needed to hear that. "Families bicker and fight among themselves from time to time, and accidents do happen. Just give Jaune some time to collect his thoughts and I'm sure things would work out."

Nora lifted her head with a soft smile and red eyes. "Thank you Renny. You always know how to make me happy." She leaned up and placed a small peck in his lips, which he returned.

"Uhg. Why don't you two get a room already?" Yang said, exasperated with all that happened. Nora's little outburst happened in the hospital waiting room, right after they heard from Jaune. It was quite a scene, as none of the others had ever seen Nora so distraught. They just couldn't help but watch as if it was an afternoon soap opera playing out before their very eyes.

Nora stepped away from Ren to face Yang, placing her hands firmly on her hips. "For you information Blondie, Renny and I have gotten our own room several times since we slaughtered that Nucklave." She then turned to her lover. "Boy Ren, that night was really fun‼ We gotta do that again soon! OH! Let's use the pancake batter Jaune's going to bring us this time. That should make things really fun"

The boy in question, the normally stoic and perpetually emotionless Lie Ren, developed a deep red blush and looked away unable to meet eyes with Nora.

Yang's mouth dropped. "No way! You two actually did it?"

Nora raised a brow and dragged Ran over to herself, clutching onto his arm. "Why wouldn't we? We're together together now. Got married back in Mistral."

This caught everyone's attention, as the whole room became silent even the passing medical staff froze in place.

Ren shook his head with a soft chuckle. "The laws of what is considered being married are a bit different in Mistral. If a couple has lived together for a certain number of years in the wilderness outside of the main city, then a licensed huntsman just needs to write a statement to the couple saying they recognize them as being married and then make sure it's mentioned in the hunter's reports."

Nora giggled into her hand and pulled out a napkin with writing on it. "We got Qrow to marry us."

"Give me that!" Qrow leaped out of his seat and snatched the napkin from Nora, who tried to take it back, but Qrow just danced around her attempts. "Shoot she's right, I did. Well at least half way. Kid you know this doesn't count unless I sent the report in right?"

Nora finally snatched back her precious napkin. "You did! And Ren sent it out to Beacon!"

Qrow looked over to Ren, he nodded. "After you recovered we found you rather inebriated at the local bar in Mistral. I filled out most of the files and just had you sign off on them. I believe I told you they were for your medical expenses which most of them were. That's also when we got your written statement. I hired a carrier Nora and I used to work with as kids, and had him deliver the reports to Beacon's Headmistress Ms. Goodwitch."

Qrow stood there with his mouth agape. He always thought he was pretty clever and that people couldn't take advantage of him, even when drunk.

Blake spoke up from her corner. "And I thought I was the sneaky one. You two are both impressive."

"I know right!" Nora hugged Ren with a smile.

Weiss sighed "I am gone for less than six months and two of my best friends get married, and I know nothing of it. Ren Nora, when this is all over I'll like to help you two set up a formal wedding ceremony."

Nora eyes sparkled as vibrant as the stars. She zipped over to Weiss and held her hands. "Oh thank you thank you thank you! We could have it in a massive castle, and a giant cake made out of pancakes! A Pancake Cake! AND-"

"Attention friends!" Weiss let out a sigh of relief when Penny showed up. "I have come to inform you that friend Oscar is alright now. He has suffered a shattered Jaw, skull fractures, several broken ribs, a punctured lung, and a severely bruised liver and spleen." Everyone cringed at hearing how badly injured the poor farm boy was. "He has been treated and is in stable condition but is still unconscious. Ruby and Maria are with him now. They asked not to be bothered."

"Jaune burned Renny and broken our adopted son, Oscar, I need to demand more pancakes from him for this." Nora pondered.

"Mr. and Mrs. Valkyrie is you are in need of sustenance I could show you to the mess hall."

"Wait Penny you knew!" Yang shouted

"Knew what friend Yang?"

"That these two are married." Yang threw her arm out to point at Ren and Nora.

"It was in their files I accessed a little while ago. I thought you all knew?" Qrow groaned knowing that if it was in the system he would be getting an earful from Glynda next time he saw her. "But what I do not understand is why friend Ren would take friend Nora's last name. Is it not the custom for the woman to take the man's name?" Penny looked over to Ren with what she hoped was an expression of curiosity.

Ren simple smiled and pointed to Qrow. "He was drunk, that's the best we could hope for."

Penny looked between the couple and Qrow before nodding. "Affirmative, friend Ren. That is a reasonable explanation. One I should have come to, perhaps my processors need to be tuned up again."

Qrow sighed. "Look, Oscar is all right and Ruby's looking after him. I say we head back and turn in for the day. Clear our heads to start planning things out in the morning. All right?"

Everyone nodded along knowing that Qrow just didn't want to hear about mistakes he made when being drunk. Soon Penny was leading them back to their rooms.

* * *

Despite looking up the exact address, it took them almost an hour to find the little parlor. When they did, both sunk deep into the leather cushions of the booth they collapsed into. Jaune was exhausted; he bluffed his way through that fight with the thugs. He used the last of his aura with the stun grenade trick of his. The rest of that fight was him just tanking blows and making it look like his aura was still intact. He leaned his head against the back of the seat and began to does off.

Neo watched him carefully. _"Is he just faking exhaustion to make me let my guard down or is he really that tired?" _Neo's questions were answered a moment later as he started to snore a little. Neo shook her head. _"This guy really is dumb. To fall asleep with a potential enemy right in front of you . . . but he did walk with me to the parlor, even kept his guard up the whole time. He could have ditched me after we finished the thugs to rest. Did he push himself just to thank me?" _

Neo's train of thought was cut off when a waitress came over to her table. Neo typed out her order and held her scroll up **"A bowl of York peppermint swirl please, and he'll order in a bit just let him rest up tonight. I think we had a bit too much fun."**

The waitress shot a glance at Jaune taking note of his disheveled state and exhaustion and looked back to Neo with a blush. "Y-yes Mam, I'll get you ice cream right away." With that the waitress scurried off to fill the order.

This was starting to get ridiculous now. Neo had finished off two bowls of Peppermint swirl, a bowl of Neapolitan, and I now starting her third bowl of Pink Lemonade Ice cream and Jaune still slept. After her second bowl she started her playlist and let it play pretty loudly. When the waitress told her to keep the music down she hopped over the table and sat between the window and Jaune and placed an ear bud in each of their ears. Even that didn't wake him. She even managed to toss a couple cherries into his open mouth. He still slept. Neo was starting to get really annoyed with this, and was tempted to just slap him awake now. She held her hand back and eyed up the exact part of his cheek she wanted to slap.

The bell to the door rang and Neo froze. Took note of her current position, kneeling on the seat beside Jaune with her torso leaning up against his right side with her hand held back, not a position she wanted someone finding her in, especially if that person was Cinder. She leaped out of the seat and back into the one across from Jaune and innocently ate her sixth bowl of ice cream as she eyed the two that came in.

They seemed to be just local kids, teenage girls to be precise. They took a seat at the counter. They didn't seem like fighters so Neo didn't bother keeping her guard fully up. Imagine Neo's Surprise when the two girls, one with vibrant pink hair, and the other with a rich chestnut color hair, walked up to the sleeping Jaune and began to argue about who would wake him. _"Good luck trying to wake this snoozer."_ Neo thought.

"ah Sunny, Sandy quite down already." Jaune groaned as he stretched his neck working out the kinks. He opened one eye and took in his surroundings. "Oh shoot I dosed off, sorry about that Pyrhha." He turned to the side, wiping the sleep off his face. "Oh you're not my sisters." He gave an embraced chuckle. "Sorry about that, Umm did you need something?"

Neo couldn't believe it, after everything she did, he wakes up to the sound of girls arguing. Neo pouted a little as she shoveled a spoon full of ice cream into her mouth. _"He instinctively wakes to the sound of a woman's voice how the hell am I supposed to top that? Wait why would I even want to top that? Hold on did he just call me Pyrhha? "_

The two girls were star struck. "Oh my Ohm! Mr. Ark just spoke to me!"

"You fool he spoke to both of us. Oh gosh, we're making him wait! Come on tell him all ready"

"Eh me? You're the one that wanted to talk to him first!"

"But you've actually meant him before. It should be easier." The pink haired one said

The chestnut blushed and stammered away. "I. . .I can't you know why! If I did that just after meeting him I'll . . ."

"Girl you'll never get anywhere like that, woman up all ready."

Jaune couldn't take it anymore. He was too exhausted to put up with or follow the girls bickering. "Stop! Please. So you both had something you wanted to say, you first." He pointed to the chestnut.

The girls face turned bright red. "I . . . I wanted to say . . . . that . . . well . . ."

Jaune was used to this, kind of; usually he had to sit through this when one of his younger sisters had to fess up about something they did. He briefly wondered where he meant her before and what she feels she did wrong. So he sat there and gave her his full attention nodding along and encouraging her to continue. _"Give them attention when in a position they cannot get out of and it'll make them fess up eventually." _

The girl fell totally silent; she fidgeted with her nails looking at the floor. Neo rolled her eyes. _"Dang girl gots a bad case of hots for him._ _She probably got a love letter in that bag of hers. Most likely carried it with her every day, but never got the guts to mail it out."_

The pink haired one gave the girl a little nudge. She looked up, her cheeks a vibrant red. "I'm sorry"

Jaune was confused, why was she apologizing? His confusion shifted to shock as a pair of lips crashed into his own. His eyes widened so much they threatened to pop out of their sockets.

_"Oh this is gold."_ Neo took out her scroll and snapped a few photos. While it was annoying having these girls interrupt her impromptu investigation she has to admit it was a bit entertaining.

The girl darted away from Jaune and hid behind her friend. Neo could have sworn she could see steam coming off the poor girls face. Jaune on the other hand was speechless, completely flabbergasted as he sat sideways in his booth leaning back into the palms of his hands. He's blank stare in the girls direction told the tall tale signs of a brain that had just crashed and was still trying to reboot.

The pink haired one almost doubled over laughing, if it wasn't for her friend holding her up as a meat shield. "Dang Girl! I never thought you'd have the guts to actually do it. Wayta go!"

The chestnut poked her head out from behind her friend. "Th-th-that was my thank you J-Jaune."

Shaking away his shock Jaune came back to his senses. "Thank you for what?!" his voice cracked a little

"You don't remember?" The girl seemed a little dejected now. "You saved me from an Alpha Beowulf, during the attack in Amity Coliseum."

"Oh" Jaune scratched the back if his head. "Sorry there was a lot going on that day for me. And I've killed a lot of Grimm so I guess it kind of got mixed in with all the rest."

The chestnut nodded from behind her friend, she still looked a little sad. Jaune looked toward the pink haired one. "You're not going to kiss me too are you?" Jaune instinctively backed up a bit in his seat.

The Pink haired girl just laughed. "Nah, you saved my pops during the attack and I just wanted to ask for your autograph." She pulled out a sharpie and her scroll.

Jaune let out a breath of relief. "Sure that I could do that." He took the sharpie and made out an autograph to a name of Carnation on the back of her scroll.

"Um . . .Mr. Arc" The chestnut finally got over her embarrassment. "If . . . Um . . .you're not um . . .seeing someone . . .would you . . .would you go out with me?!" she hastily blurted out that last bit.

Neo's amusement suddenly went south. It was one thing to watch her pray squirm, it was quite another to have it potentially taken from her. Neo had to force herself to repress her devious grin as she set her semblance to work. Creating a very terrifying looking tarantella on the chestnut girls back and having it slowly craw its way up.

Jaune sighed and placed a hand in his chest plate. "I'm sorry but there is someone." This took Neo by surprised as she turned to face him with a questioning look. The two girls looked over to Neo and getting the completely wrong idea let out a soft "Oh."

Jaune gave the girls a bright smile when he looked back to them "Don't worry though; there's plenty of great guys out that who aren't so noodlely. Just remember that confidence is all you'll nee - - EEHHHHHHH‼!"

Jaune's totally not girlish scream was echoed by two more as the girls finally took note of the tarantula crawling up the Chestnut's shoulder. Neo could only chuckle and start recording the chaos that ensued. She never expected Jaune, a guy who stood his ground against Cinder, would be terrified of a spider. She watched as the girls flailed about trying to smack the spider off of each other as it leaped between them avoiding every strike with grace no arachnid should possesses. Finely the girls made a run for the exit leaving the spider behind on the both next to Jaune.

He stared at it. It stared back. His eyes locked with the numerous eyes of the tarantula. It flinched. Jaune instantly grabbed Pep's half eaten bowl of ice cream and brought it down on the poor spider. There was a shattering of glass, a splattering of ice cream, and the silent grumbling of Pep. Jaune lifted up the bowl to see the glass like shards of the spider, he totally wasn't afraid of, dissolve into thin air. Jaune looked over to Pep. "Was this your doing? A semblance or something?"

Pep rolled her watery eyes and furiously typed out a response. Jaune wondered why she was so mad. **"Yes it was my semblance, and you wasted a perfectly good bowl of ice cream‼"'**

Jaune looked down where the spider used to be. "So you could make imitation animals? That's weird" Jaune wiped some of the splattered ice cream from his face and eat it. "Hmm Pink Lemonade. That's pretty good." Jaune waved his hand getting the waitresses attention while he continued to wipe up and eat the remaining ice cream in his face. "Ma'am, could we get two more bowls of your Pink Lemonade ice cream?"

The waitress looked him over and the mess on the seat and floor and walls. Boy was she going to have a long night. "Very well sir, two more bowls coming right up. I would also suggest finding other both while we clean this one up" She rushed away to the kitchen after that.

Jaune looked over to Pep. "Well that seems to be taken care of. Pep? Pep, are you all right?"

Neo had placed her head into her hands. This was the second bowl of ice cream that she had to morn in a single day. Neo nodded from behind her hands as she silently wept for her dessert. She flinched a little when she felt a hand in her shoulder.

"Hey, look if I said something hurtful about your semblance I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that." Jaune began to rub her back in the comforting way he used to for his sisters as he spoke.

Neo couldn't help but silently snicker at the boy_. "Ohm this boys is such a fool. But I gotta give him credit for being a gentleman."_

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading, and maybe reviewing, my story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.**

**Thanks for being patient with me for this chapter. Finals was stressful and really time consuming. **

**Also I used Maishusi's version of Jaune's twin sisters Sandy and Sunny, from her Family story. though in that one the twins are older than Jaune, here I'm mixing up the birth order of Jaune and his sisters.**

**Also one of my Author friends started leaving me shout outs in their stories, So I cannot leave them hanging. Here are a few good stories to read.**

**A Rosegarden Seedling By ****Miasushi, A great RubyxOscar fic that works out most of the negatives with that ship.**

**Pink Lemonade By EnderFire1 another JaunexNeo fic without as much nefarious plans in it.**

**Desires for power (OC story) By killua menace a pretty decent OC team story, though I maybe biased on that one.**

**and finally **

**Lost Star By ****Emma Nonn a pretty good GlyndaxOC fic, be warned it's rated M for language.**


	5. Chapter 5

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

Ruby walked to and fro about the little hospital room that Oscar was assigned too. She couldn't do anything while he lay unconscious in the bed. So she put herself to work cleaning up the room. Maria was with her and looking over some of the machines that beeped and flashed, which were hocked up to Oscar.

Maria taped one of them with the end of her cane. "What on Remnant are all this things for? Is Atlas trying to make the poor boy die from a migraine?"

"Stop that," Ruby demanded. "Their needed to monitor his vitals, and stuff."

Apparently Oscar did not take the increase of noise very well as he tried to roll over only to start wheezing and coughing.

Ruby was on him in an instant, using her semblance in a blast of rose petals to be by his side. Carefully lifting Oscar's head and back off the mattress she adjusted a few pillows behind him and gentle laid him back down. His breathing seemed to get a little better.

"Why do you think he did this?" Ruby asked, her eyes focused on Oscar and her voice small and weak. "Why would Jaune hurt someone like this? He's a huntsman, right?"

Maria sighed. "Child you should know by now that not all huntsmen do what's right. As for your friend, I'm not sure _why_ he did it. But grief could make a person do many horrible things."

Ruby looked across the dimly lit room to meet the blue cybernetic eyes of Maria. "What do you mean? Pyrhha? But that was almost a year ago."

Maria shook her head. "You and I both know how precious life is and, it seems that boy has learned that lesson once it was too late. Now it's eating away at him, it has been for the past year."

Ruby shook her head. "I don't understand. how can that be? Jaune was always there for us after the fall. He kept us going with that smile of his. Even when he had to sleep outside on a rainy mistral nights he would still wake is with a bright smile." Ruby clenched her fists. "How can someone so positive and helpful, be eaten away for over a year and just look fine. Wouldn't one of us been able to tell, and help him?"

Maria let out a heavy and deep sigh. "Child grief affects everyone differently. You have some like yourself, who face their loss head on and use it as fuel to fight on and grow stronger. You have some, like your uncle, who only wish to forget all that pain and attempts to wash it away with alcohol or other narcotics."

Ruby turned slightly and eyed the door, which would lead out to her friends and uncle. Reconsidering why it was her uncle really drank.

"Then you have those that just push their feeling aside," Maria continued. "For them, the feel they do not have time to feel sad. Or that they must be strong for others that depend on them. Whichever the reason those people never show their pain to other. It jest festers within them each day, like a Grimm pit. And just like those pits, it would one day let out a terrible creature, one of despair and heart ache. Once that happens, it doesn't matter how noble or caring a person you are, you will fall to those dark emotions. And sometimes all it takes is for someone to poke at it, to bring them out." She sighed and looked into the skull eyes of her cane. "It is hard to tell when someone is suffering like that. Only others that have been though the same could spot it. The why he over worked himself, how he clutched too his sword and armor, even that time in Argus where he ran off."

Ruby fell into a chair. How could she have missed that. Maria had only known Jaune since they meant in Argus yet she saw all that. Ruby traveled with him for six months. She watched him train till exhaustion to the video Pyrhha had made him. Ruby saw all of that with her own eyes and yet never once considered why he did that. That Jaune was pushing himself so hard just so he could hide the emotions eating at him. Ruby's head fell into her hands. She took a deep breath trying to control herself and keep the tears away. "Maria, how? How were you able to tell Jaune was going through that?"

Maria pulled herself into another chair. "Child weren't you even paying attention?" she chided. "I told you I went through that myself. I lost my entire team to a wyvern once." Maria's gloves creaked against her cane as her gripped tightened on it. "After that I pushed those emotions aside. Told myself I had to be strong for them and rid the world of those beasts." Maria sighed. "Those emotions eventually lead me to be careless and ended with me losing my eyes to an enemy." She paused, letting Ruby take her words in. "That boy needs his friends more than ever now, just be there for when he realizes that."

Ruby nodded and looked back to Oscar, trying to figure out what all this meant for their teams.

* * *

Neo could not take her eyes away from the scene before her. Within a matter of minutes, or maybe it was seconds, the scraggly blond boy practically inhaled a large bowl of Pink Lemonade ice cream, followed by a large banana split sundae, and now ravenously eating out a pint of Neapolitan. It was just uncanny for Neo to find anyone else that would pack away the ice cream like she did. Yet here was this boy just completely out doing her.

She blankly handing handed him a napkin to wipe the ice cream smeared across his jaw away but he just ignored it and continued eating like he starved for days. _"Geez what the heck is with this guy? One minute he's a dumb hero, then a snooze fest, then a scaredy cat, a gentleman, and now a mad beast. Can Cinder even use this guy, he's more of a wild card than even I am."_

Jaune leaned back patting his stomach. "Whooo, that was good. I guess aura depletion really works up the appetite." He waved down a waitress. "Excuse me miss, could I get a bowl of Peanut Butter Banana ice cream please?"

The waitress sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "These guys are going to eat us out of house and home," She mumbled to herself before bringing out her professional smile which was just a little forced. "Sure thing sir, is there anything more the lady would like too?"

Neo, final coming out of her stunned trance, holds up her scroll. **"I'll take that Atlas Home-style burger and shake compo, make the shake Neapolitan layered."**

The waitress nodded and headed off to fill their orders.

With his stomach full and his head rested Jaune finally had a moment to take in Peps appearance. He'd always been too preoccupied to do so, fearing for the lives of others, sleeping, facing off against a deadly mutant spider, and eating that he never gave attention to Pep. And right now he was glad he didn't and almost wished he never did.

His heart struggled to beat, and his throat closed off. He didn't want to look any longer but at the same time he couldn't look away. Before him sat Pep. A beautiful woman. Her dark emerald eyes, highlighted with matching eye shadow, with their look of joy and bliss as she at her ice cream. Her bright green eyes that hid her sorrow. Those emeralds, those magnificent eyes that oh so resembled another set of emeralds. Just their glancing stare made his heart shatter. Jaune brought, his hand up to his breast plate clutching it, in all hopes that doing so would hold the broken pieces of his heart together.

Jaune's eyes were torn away from those emerald ones when Pep brushed one of her bright red locks of hair out of her face. Despite the streaks of white in her hair, it's bright color, and silk like appearance could only be matched by one other. The hair, bright like the blazing fire, of a lonely woman that wanted nothing more than a friend in her life. Jaune clutched at his armor, aura sparking off his fingertips as he desperately tried to keep the pieces of his heart from slipping out of his hand. He didn't even notice his vision blur slightly as his eyes began to water.

Pep looked up from her bowl, her eyes meant his for only a second, but it felt like an eternity. An eternity of pain as the pieces of his heart shattered into dust within his hand. Pep's soft and pleasant smile didn't help at all. No he wasn't looking at Pep, in this moment, he was looking at Pyrhha. The vibrant red hair, the deep emerald eyes that hid a fire and sadness, the soft smile of finding something to be happy for, it was all Pyrhha. He couldn't take it anymore, he started to feel sick and leaned his head against the back of the seat. His eyes sealed shut as he desperately tried to fight back his tears and regain any fragment of his heart he had left within him.

With his head rested against the seat and his emotions finally under control, his stomach finally caught up to his crazy eating and settled back down. He knew she caught him staring at her, so he had to say something now. "So Pep, thanks' for saving me back there, with the thugs and stuff. Honestly what you did was really amazing. I've never seen a huntress move like that. It was graceful, on point, powerful, heck you even looked beautiful while beating the guy down. Not many could pull that off. Where'd you learn to pull that off?"

Pep looked up from playing with her spoon and her empty bowl then typed out a message. **"I had a really good teacher. He was nowhere near as 'graceful' as I am, but he showed me how to be efficient and helped me develop my own fighting style that really took advantage of my strengths."**

Jaune glanced from the scroll to Pep. Her dark green eyes were almost distant as if struggling to stay in the moment, her cherry red lips were curled into a slight smile. Jaune knew this look. He saw it in the mirror nearly every morning. When he would wake up and forget he wasn't at beacon. That Pyrhha wasn't there to throw the curtains open and greet him. It was the look of someone that didn't want others to know they were in pain. The look of longing for someone you once loved.

"He sounds like a great guy. I am glad you had him. What was he like?" He winced, he knew talking about those that passed was hard, but the question was the first thing that came to mind. The first thing to ask that seemed sincere. _"Dang it Jaune, get yourself together, no one wants to relive that pain!"_ He coughed, "I mean if you're comfortable with telling me that is."

The waitress returned with their meal and Pep typed out her response with one hand and ate her burger with the other. **"Not much to say about him. He was cool, flamboyant, and only cared about himself."**

Jaune watched Pep for a moment, thinking over her response, he let out a sigh. "That's cool, but what's your opinion of him, not the Remnant's"

Pep mid bite stared at him with a cocked brow, as if asking what he meant.

"Well, my mentor was Pyrhha Nikos. Remnant thought she was a woman of legends an honorable, and brave worrier that never backed down and won every fight with shear skill. But that's just what the world saw, and it wasn't her. Pyrhha was a kind girl, one that worried about others, and one that feared many things. She feared isolation, enemies, and feared for the safety of her friends. She wasn't a warrior at heart, she once told me she rather, be a stay at home mother than a fighter. But if she had to fight the she'll chose to fight and protect the mothers that couldn't."

He chuckled to himself. "Everyone thought she always looked perfect, but if you've seen her in the mornings you wouldn't recognize her. She would get up almost hour before everyone else just to fix her makeup and hair, polish her armor and make herself up into the pretty image the world wanted to see. She always hated that. Pyrhha envied one of our teammate, Nora, because she never bothered to, or had to do anything more than show and be off for the day."

He took in a shuttering breath, and looked up to the ceiling. Closing his eyes to hold back the tears he continued on. "Pyrhha Nikos, my mentor and my partner, was not the paragon of a huntress the world thought her as, she was a shy, frightened and lonely girl. One that wanted nothing more than to find a friend and. . . and a love to end her solitude."

Pep placed her half eaten burger down and wrapped the sauce on her face off. Picking up her scroll she hesitated, her fingers hovering above the screen, her eyes rocking side to side. **"**_She's debating if it's safe to open up to me about her mentor. It's definitely a hard thing to do. I nearly lost it telling Pep just that little about Pyrhha."_

Pep clenched a fist, taking a deep breath and began to type. Jaune let her take as much time as she needed to write, delete, rewrite, and correct as she wanted. **"He was a really sweet man. He only cared about three things, Himself, Family, and Money. He really was flamboyant and had a great taste in fashion, one of the many things I learned from him. He was hard working too. Give him any job, and as long as the price matched the risk he would get it done perfectly and with style. He liked to make life fun, make the mundane exciting, the dreary happy, and the best of a worst situation. But he had a good head on his shoulders too, and wasn't a party-boy. Many people would call him a coward, but he knew when to call it quits or back down, and because of that he always lived to see another day."**

Jaune looked over to Pep, her eyes watered and not even her blinking could hold those tears back as one or two slipped through and down the soft pail skin of her cheeks. _"Dang it Jaune! You made a lady cry. You really were stupid to ask this of her. You gotta say something to help her, think. Dang! Why can't I talk to woman right? All I need is confidence, right? Come on you could do this Jaune, you consoled your sisters several time. Even helped when Sandy's pet turtle died. But this is not as simple as a turtle! But I got my own experience so I at least could avoid possible emotional triggers."_

Jaune took a deep breath and steeled his nerves, his next words was wither going to bring a smile to Pep's face, or make her cry even harder, he was hoping for the former. "That's a good thing, to know, when to back out. It's not cowardly at all. I say it rather brave, to be willing to admit defeat. But things. . ." He choked back a sob. "But sometimes things don't work out, and go really wrong." Jaune couldn't keep the tears running down his own face right now. How many times had he try to tell himself these vary words? He closed his eyes tight to will the tears away. That was a mistake as he didn't see his eye lids but Pyrhha though the slats of a locker, growing smaller and smaller in the distance. "But there's nothing we could -."

Jaune jumped in his seat. His words dyeing in his mouth as he looked up at Pep. She had slammed her hand into the table and was glaring down at her milkshake. She heaved deep unsteady breaths. The lose strands of her bright red hair with thick white streaks fell over her face. She looked haggard and very mad. Jaune knew he was going to get a reaction from Pep with his speech, but he never thought he would make her this angry.

Pep looked up and locked eyes with his, they were fierce, with a burning fire that he felt threatened to burn his very soul. But he saw something else in her green eyes too. He saw pain, it was pain and anger that was fueling the fire in her eyes. Jaune swallowed to calm his nerves. It felt hard to do, like he attempted to swallow an ice cube whole.

She stood up but still leaning over the table she seemed to tower over him too. _"She must be standing on her seat," _his brain momentarily answered. Her eyes lever left his as she began to move her arms about. It forced him to brake eye contact and watch. There was no grace in her movements. They were sharp, and powerful, each motion of her arms every gesture seemed to be filled with the same burning fire he saw in her eyes. Yet even these motions of raw emotion that Pep did still had its elegance to them. Not the elegance of a ballerina or a fair princess, but the elegance of a great king or warrior as they walked onto the battle field. The same elegance he would see from Pyrhha before she would enter a serious fight. The fierce elegance she had when he was blasted off from the locker he was trapped in.

Her gestures honestly caught him off guard and it took him a minute to realize she was repeating a couple of them. It dawn on him _"These were not just any gestures she is talking to you with sign language."_

"Wait wait wiat!" He called out, waving his own arms. Pep froze glaring daggers at him. "I don't understand sign language. I'll listen to what you are trying to tell me but please type it out."

Pep clicked her tongue and plopped back into her seat and began typing. A whole lot of mad typing. He was surprised her scroll didn't crack with how hard she was typing. _"Boy am I in for an earful. Why did she even get mad though?"_

Pep tossed him her scroll, which bounced off his face and into his hands, before she went to downing her milkshake. Jaune focused on the scroll, he figured she needed time, and the milkshake, to cool down.

**"Don't you dear say I couldn't have done anything. And Don't ever EVER say that my mentor made a mistake. He never made mistakes. He was always a survivor. He always did everything he could to survive, made an art out of it. He allied, and brown nosed with those stronger than him in exchange for living. He tricked, or befriended those of equal strengthen so they paid him no attention. He destroyed those weaker than him so they would never be a threat latter on. He never underestimated an enemy, always ready for some trick or hidden weapon. He never made a mistake when it came to making sure he survived. **

**I was the one that made the mistake."**

Jaune looked up from the scroll to find Pep staring down into her near empty milkshake glass as she fiddled with the spoon to get the last bits of ice cream. Between her hung head and her loose bangs he couldn't see much of her face. He did spot the few glistening tear drops that rolled off of her cheek and chin. He didn't miss the way she took a deep breath to calm herself only to have it shutter and heave her whole body in sobs. His heart crumpled in his chest, he knew what she felt. That she blamed herself for letting her mentor die. He did the same too, though it didn't last too long. Even if he did go with Pyrhha to the top of Beacon tower what would he have reasonably done, Cinder would have just knocked him off the roof with a flick of her wrist back then. He turned back to the scroll.

**"I was the one that made the mistake. I got full of myself during our last battle. I thought we had our enemy at the end of their rope. I let my guard down and they got the better of me. They took me out of the fight. By that time I was the last person my mentor considered family. He must have been worried pants-less at what happened to me. **

**It must have been just enough time for our enemy to kill him. I wasn't even able to find a body to burry. He is gone because I messed up. **

**What was the point of surviving. My mentor always told me it was for your family. But without him I don't have any. So I survive to put his soul to rest. To take down the one that took him. Now that he's gone it's all I can do for him.**

**So if you tell me there's nothing I could have done for him, or that I can do for him now, you might as well be telling me to stop breathing, or to give up ice cream. So keep your sentiments to yourself I don't want them or need them."**

Jaune placed her scroll down on the table. "Pep, I'm sorry I didn't mean it like that I . . ."

Pep snatched her scroll back and walked past him, flashing him one last message. **"Shut up already."**

Jaune watched her leave the parlor. _"Shoot I cannot leave things like this."_ Jaune got up and ran to the door before freezing. _"Pep didn't pay."_ Dashing for the counter he called for the waitress, panic evident in his voice. "Excuse me! Excuse me. Can I pay for our meal already?"

He waited nervously as the casher pulled up their orders. His fingers drumming along the counter top. As soon as the scanner asked for payment he swiped his scroll across the screen to pay and dashed away.

* * *

He burst through the parlor door, his head on the swivel. Something caught his eye in the distance. A person, it had to be her. He dashed over breath heaving, apparently running on an overstuffed stomach has the same effect as swimming right after eating. When he finally caught up to them her buckled over catching his breath. "Whoo, Pep you sure are fast. Look mind if a keep you company on your way back home?" Jaune stood straight and set his eyes on the person before him, only to freeze in his tracks again.

He wasn't talking to Pep, at all. Standing before him was a little girl. She held her arms close to her chest and backed away from him, face racked with fear, with wide golden eyes.

He took a step back and looked around. No one else in sight, so he found a lost child instead of Pep. Dang his luck, he cannot just leave this girl out here. Jaune knelt down to bring himself to eye lever with the girl. He made sure to keep his hand in front of himself and open where she could see them. "Hey there, I'm sorry I scared you, I thought you were a friend of mine." Juane's eyes were drawn to her tattered pink shirt and worn pink boots. _"This child's definitely been through a lot, what brought her out to the streets?"_

The girl took a step cautious step back.

"Hey, It's all right. I'm not here to hurt you. Are you okay? Where are your parents?" Jaune asked

The girl nodded and pointed behind him, not moving her hand to far from her chest. _"Smart kid staying out of arms reaches,"_ crossed through Jaune's mind as he turned around. Across the street a woman was running over to him.

A flash of pink in his peripheral vision had him spin around. The girl had darted away down the street. Jaune stood, before he could do anything the child and the woman meant at the corner. The girl clung tightly to the woman and seemed to say something not pleasant about him, as the woman looked up to him. Blue eyed locked with fiery ember eyes, and a furious glare.

Jaune scratched the back of his head and gave his best smile. In response the woman pushed the child behind her and hefted up a rather large red purse. If living with Nora has taught him anything is that ANYTHING, even a stack of pancakes, could be a weapon and with how the lady seemed to swing it as she charged him, that purse was definitely a weapon in this moment.

Jaune turned on heal and ran as fast as his bloated gut would allow him. "I'm Sorry!" he hollered back hoping it would stop the deadly purse from perusing him. He guessed it worked since after he turned a corner the woman was nowhere to be found. After a couple more blocks of running Jaune paused to catch his breath. "Dang it. I forget to get het scroll number. I even held her scroll and still didn't get it," he lamented as he trudged back to Atlas academy.

* * *

Neo let out a sigh of relief after Jaune rounded the corner. She let her semblance fade, the purse yielding mad woman shattering into fragments of glass that dissipated into glitter like dust that drifted off throughout the air. The image of the woman wasn't the only thing that shattered. Neo let her child image fall as well, not really caring in the moment, she returned to her natural appearance. She wiped her heterochromatic pink and brown eyes free of tears. _"Such a foolish man. To come looking for me."_ Normally any guys that sought her out usually had a death sentence, and either wanted her protection, or wanted to end her for protection. Either way it usually resulted in death for them. _"So why did he chase after her? Did he want something from her? Or was it something else, did he actually care that he hurt her feelings?" _ Neo shook her head, dispelling those thoughts. She didn't have time for this. _"gentlemen or not, I don't have time to be playing sappy games with him." _With that she dawned her Pep appearance and headed back to the motel, mentally preparing herself to deal with Cindy.

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading, and maybe reviewing, my story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.**

**Thanks for being patient with me for this chapter. Finals was stressful and really time consuming. **

** Here are a few good stories to read.**

**A Rosegarden Seedling By ****Miasushi, A great RubyxOscar fic that works out most of the negatives with that ship.**

**Pink Lemonade By EnderFire1 another JaunexNeo fic without as much nefarious plans in it.**

**Desires for power (OC story) By killua menace a pretty decent OC team story, though I maybe biased on that one.**

**and finally **

**Lost Star By ****Emma Nonn a pretty good GlyndaxOC fic, be warned it's rated M for language.**


	6. Chapter 6

**The Cover Art is a wonderful piece of art work done by yuumei titled "Under the Overpass" please support this talented artist at yuumeiart . com **

**This is not endorsed by Rooster Teeth in any way. Views, opinions, and thoughts are all my own. Rooster Teeth and RWBY and all RWBY related characters are trade names or registered trademarks of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. © Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.**

* * *

When Jaune got back to Atlas academy he expected to have to deal with a hungry and mad Nora, a punch happy Yang, and a disappointed Ruby. What he did not expect to deal with was atlas security.

As soon as he walked into campus he was meant with a guard that frisked him, rather rudely, and confiscated his grocery bag. He then got a delightful armed guard escort straight to Headmaster Ironwood's office.

Strange he didn't remember the walk up to the headmaster's office being so long before. The halls were empty and every step rang out.

"Soo, what's the deal?" Jaune asked.

The guard did not answer. He just scowled and gestured with his gun to keep moving forward. It was then Jaune noticed that the guard did not have the safety on. Not only that but he kept his finger very close to the trigger.

Jaune swallowed a lump in his throat. _"Were those alley punks more than just punks? Or is this about what happened with Oscar? Shoot either way I'm in deep water."_

The walk seemed to stretch on forever yet could not last long enough for Jaune. With each step he got closer to what he felt like his execution. The final maze of file cabinets was where all hope was lost when he set eyes on Ironwood.

Gone was the kind man from earlier. The man sat tall, strong, and emotionless was the general. He was the general of Remnant's most powerful army.

"Thank you private, you are dismissed," Ironwoods tone was stiff, commanding, with no sign of emotion it held earlier: A perfect match to his demeanor.

_"This definitely isn't good."_ Ironwood's presence seemed to fill the already cramped office space and weigh Jaune down. It crushed him like a soda can.

"Ah . . . Ironwood?" Jaune began.

"Silence! You will speak when asked to, Mr. Arc" The sudden introduction of the powerful female voice had Jaune nearly jump out of his skin.

The voice came off to the side; how Jaune could miss her he had no clue. But what stunned him the most was not the fact there was a third person in the room but how much like Weiss this woman looked.

The white hair, the blue eyes, her elegance, heck she even got that Weiss cold glare too, this was definitely Weiss' older sister, Winter Schnee.

The woman looked vicious. If it wasn't for Ironwood's overwhelming presence he was sure he would have been wounded by the daggers she was glaring at him.

Though, Jaune couldn't help but wonder if Weiss would be as endowed as her sister in a few years' time, but now was clearly not the time to ponder that question. He gave Winter a clear nod and turned to face the general. _"Great two women that look like the two friends I crushed on. Can this night get any worse?"_

"Mr. Arc, do you know why you were brought here?" Jaune could only shake his head. "You have committed a crime, several in fact, on academy grounds. As such I have to dispense an appropriate sentence. "

The room seemed to suddenly close in on Jaune. All color left his face. It took all his strength to not tremble at how oppressive Ironwood was. He refused to let himself look to Winter as he felt she must had been snickering at his misfortune right now. _"Dang it. I'm headed for the gallows aren't I?"_

Ironwood, sat tall in his chair, the few steps leading up to his desk let him just above eye level with Jaune. "Winter, inform Mr. Arc on what he's being charged with." His eyes never left Jaune when he spoke.

Winter stepped forward with an open folder. "Yes Sir. Attempted murder two Atlas Academy guest, disfigured an Officer, destroyed Atlas property, and injured three other academy guests in his cross fire, and fled the scene of the assault."

With each accusation he saw his world shatter further. His lags shook, and his heart raced. Jaune's eyes were wide and his mouth hung ajar. _"Did I really do all that?_ _Was I really about to kill Oscar?_" His heart was pounding in his hears and no matter how he tried to breath her couldn't get any air into his lungs.

"Wait, I didn't kill anyone and Disfigurement! I never did that. No wait, you don't mean I actually reshaped Oscar's face?" He looked between the two people in the room waiting for them to contradict him. He gave a nervous laugh. "I 'm strong but no way am I that strong."

Neither Ironwood nor Winter was amused by his outburst. "No Mr. Arc. The injuries to Oscar were not severe enough to reshape his face, they were bad enough to leave him in critical condition for several hours in our med bay and now he lays unconscious there as we speak."

That shut Jaune up right away as he broke out in a cold sweat.

Ironwood went right on though. "You did however melt away half of Penny's face, it would take time to repair her artificial skin. She may not show it but being forced to look like a robot deeply troubles her."

Jaune swallowed a lump in his throat, had he really done that to Penny?

"Moving on, Winter, were any charges pressed against him, by those involved?"

"None, Sir."

The relief from hearing his friends didn't want him in trouble was nearly enough to make his tense body nearly collapse when it was relieved.

"Does he have any history of violent behavior?"

"Again, none Sir. The testimonials of those involved support this claim as well. Many saying, this was the first time he acted like this." Winter flipped through her file. "There is one acceptation though. Ms. Rose stated there was an incident back in Argus where he pinned Oscar to a wall. But no one was injured during the incident, and no other acts of aggression took place either."

Ironwood turned back to Jaune, his expression flat and neutral. "Jaune, could you explain why this happened, and why you have a fixation on harming Oscar?"

Jaune held onto one arm and looked to the floor. The roller-coaster of intense emotions had drained him to the point of mental and physical exhaustion. _"Why did I do that? Why have I threatened Oscar as I have? No not Oscar, Ozpin. It was always Ozpin I was mad at."_

"It was never Oscar I was mad at." He spoke with his head down, hung in shame that had welled up within and threatened to drown him. "It was Ozpin, for lying to us. But that doesn't excuse what I did." He sighed and waited for his sentencing.

Ironwood nodded to this. "Very well, I am glad to see you are excepting responsibility for your transgressions. Typical sentences for crimes like this is either 48 consecutive hours confined in a public prison, or 96 hours of community service, with a daily minimum requirement of 4.5 hours of supervised work completed each day. Since this is your first offense here, I will grant you the freedom to select which of those two sentences you wish to complete."

"I. . . I'll take the community services, Sir." He jumped on it, faster than Ruby's semblance; he eagerly took the better of the two options. "At least that way some good could come from my mistakes."

"Very well Mr. Arc, your sentencing of 96 hours of community service will begin tomorrow morning. I am also requiring you to visit our counselor for three meetings over emotional control and dealing with them in a healthy manner."

"What? Why are you adding that? I'm not crazy, it was just one outburst. And I could just learn emotional control from Ren if I need to."

Ironwood sighed; he seemed to relax a bit, his tone a bit softer. "Winter, remove his restraints."

"But Sir, I don't think that is wise, he—"

Ironwood swiftly cut Winter's line of thought off. "He is not a deranged criminal, Winter. He has also admitted to his mistakes and as accepting the consequence of them too. He is not a threat."

She stiffened momentarily, nodding to his reasoning. Begrudgingly she removes the cuffs on Jaune's wrists.

Ironwood stood from his desk and walked over to him as he spoke. His hands folded behind his back. His oppressive demeanor gone but Jaune still couldn't help but feel small as the general approached him "Jaune, what do you think is the most common thing between Huntsman and the Military?"

"Um . . . Mechashift weapons?" Jaune tried, he was nervous and his brain would not work right, after having so many adrenalin highs.

"No it's mental scarring." Jaune looked over Ironwoods face, looking to see if he was joking. There we no signs of that. Instead it was a look of concern, almost like the one his father had when he told him he wanted to be a huntsman.

"Both soldiers and huntsman, face many devastating situations, and from these situations stems survivor's guilt, grief, trauma, PTSD and many more emotional hardships."

Ironwood placed a kind hand on Jaune's shoulder. "A huntsman or a soldier is only as strong as their heart is, and mental scarring can tear even the strongest man's heart to shreds. It's why we treat that here, to ensure all our huntsmen and soldiers are strong enough to save others."

Jaune sighed. "All right Ironwood, I'll give it a shot."

A slight smile tugged at the corners of Ironwood's mouth. "Very well. Winter, please return Jaune's possessions and assign appropriate civil services for him."

"Yes, Sir. Follow me." With that she walked swiftly past Jaune the through the maze of file cabinets.

Jaune wasted no time following her; he didn't want to add disorderly conduct to his list of charges.

* * *

Jaune followed Winter to a store room. The walk there was just as silent and nerve racking as the one to the headmaster's office. Why did he have the feeling Winter hated his guts? She stopped at a door. With a swipe of her scroll and some code she punched into the key pad the door unlocked. But before she could open it someone called out to her.

Both Jaune and Winter turned to see who it was. Jaune couldn't shake the feeling that he's meant this tanned skinned and blue barrette wearing girl before. Actually what was a girl like her doing at an Atlas school for huntsman? She seemed even younger than Ruby.

"Ceil, what is it, and why are you about at this hour? I am busy at the moment, make it quick," Winter snapped her eyes narrowing on the small girl.

Ceil took a moment to compose herself before her expression firmed itself and her eyes held a glint of fire and determination. This was a girl that had something to loose, and she was fighting to hold on to it. It was something Jaune saw in the others many times, most notably Ruby.

"It's about my grandmother. I—"

Ceil never got a chance to finish when Winter butted in. "Now is not the time to discuss that. And I believe Headmaster Ironwood has already explained the situation to you. Now, you are dismissed." The way she said that last line, firm and commanding, made sure that Ceil know there was no more she could get to say at that moment.

Ceil gave a soft nod and walked off, and the awkward silence between him and Winter came back.

"Ah . . . right, so may I have my pancakes back?"

Winter, quirked a brow to that but still went into the storage room to gather Jaune's things. After a moment she returned with a crate.

"From this time here is your wallet and grocery bag containing two boxes of toaster pancakes and a jar of burn cream. From the first time when you and your friends were brought in, here is your Sword, Shield, and armor."

Winter slid his sword out of its sheath a bit, noting her near pristine reflection in its blade. Returning it to its sheath with a nod and a very slight smile she handed his sword over to him.

"Thank you, ah . . . Ms. Winter?"

Winter nodded. "That would do. Tomorrow you will report to my office at Seven hundred hours to be assigned your first community service. Do to how long you will be serving this sentence you may be switched between different tasks."

Jaune only half paying attention as he strapped on his armor. "All right, what would I be expected to do?"

Winter shook her head at his unusual acceptance of the situation. "Due to your violent acts you will be given a non-combat oriented task. You will also be given one that would not put children of other civilians in harm's way in case you have another . . . outburst. So expect manual labor and cleaning."

Jaune nodded along. "Yes, Ms. Winter. Ah is that all?"

Winter gave a curt nod. "Yes you are dismissed; I suggested heading straight to your dorm to avoid any more problems."

"Yes Ma'am" With that Jaune left, while Winter inwardly cringed at being called Ma'am.

* * *

Jaune walks up to his dorm room. Just like back in Beacon his team had a room across from team RWBY. He figured it would be easier to straighten things out with his team first.

His hand, and scroll, froze above the lock. Would his team really take him back after what he did to them?

Ren didn't seem mad in the texts, but then again Ren almost never seems mad. Nora was easier to read, she always wore her emotions and her heart on her sleeve. She definitely sounded like she wanted him back. Though he was pretty sure he'll have to deal with Judge, Jury, and executioner Nora before she let things blow over.

His eyes dropped to the convenient store bag her carried. He couldn't find any pancake mix, or even 500 premade pancakes, it was hard enough to find a single store open this late. He just hoped that two dozen toaster pancake would be enough to lower his sentence from pulverized legs to just broken legs.

He let out a long sigh and let s hand drop to his side. _"Do I even deserve any of them after what I did?"_

He had hurt the teammates that Pyrhha had once cared so much for. Hurt them without even thinking. Not only them, but he also hurt Blake, Qrow, and even Penny, all people close to his best friend Ruby. Would she hate him for that?

The door lock clicked open dragging Jaune from his thoughts.

Willing whatever confidence he had left he pushed the door open to have his friends. He found Ren and Nora standing at the center of their dorm. He didn't miss the fact that Nora positioned herself between him and Ren, or the fact that she was holding her hammer.

If you were to ask Nora she would tell you the tension in that little room as a thick as hardened maple syrup. She flexed her fingers around the shaft of her hammer.

Jaune let out a sigh and ran his fingers through his hair. "Look I'm sorry for going, for freaking out like I did. I never meant to hurt anyone."

"You hurt Oscar, and meant it." Nora cut him off with a stern glare.

"I. . ." Jaune looked away, he couldn't keep eye contact. It was difficult when he saw such pain in Nora's normally happy and bubbly eyes. "I wanted to hurt Ozpin, not Oscar. I'm sorry I really shouldn't have done that."

Nora's eyes darted around the room; she readjusted her grip in the hammer a couple of times and shifted her stance slightly. She was torn. Torn between believing his sincerity and protecting what she cared for.

She calmed down when Ren placed a hand on her shoulder and Jaune took that as his queue "I did bring the burn cream you asked for, and I tried to get the 500 pancakes but I could only get a couple dozen, their triple chocolate delight though."

Nora placed her hammer down and tentatively took the bag from Jaune. After finding its contents satisfactory, she split her face in half with a wide cheery grim.

She pulled Jaune off his feet with a bone crushing hug. "Oh I could never stay mad at you fearless leader!"

"Nora, please, if you don't put him down my might become a pancake." Ren gave a small smirk and looked to the quickly purpling Jaune. "It is nice to have you back Jaune. No hard feelings between us, I understand things have been heard for you and with recent events it must have been especially difficult."

"Thanks . . . Ren," Jaune wheezed as he patted Nora's back to get her to let him go. To his relief Nora did loosen her grip on him. She gently let him stand on his own feet and held him, her forehead resting in his breast plate.

"Jaune, am I your sister?"

Her voice was soft and weak. Something he never expected from the power house of a teammate that Nora was. "Uh What?"

Her arms tightened just a little around him, as if she didn't what to loose what she clung to. At his perplexed expression Ren, to his relief, offered an explanation.

"Jaune, you know Nora and I grow up alone, we never had brothers or sisters, even back in Kuroyuri, neither of us had siblings. Jaune you are like a brother to us, you and Pyrhha, were, and are the only family we have now."

"Jaune, please, am I your sister?"

It was a desperate whisper she spoke in. Almost inaudible if it wasn't for how close they were.

Jaune looked down at the top of Nora's red hair. She trembled ever so slightly as she breathed. He placed a hand in her head. "Yeah, Nora, you're my sister."

She began to softly chuckle, one mixed with the shuttered breathing as her body heaved with sobs. "Ren, you hear that," her voice shaky and soft. "We have a brother now. We actually got a brother."

"Yes we do, Nora. I couldn't have chosen anyone better to be our brother."

Jaune chuckled. "You know I cannot be both of your brothers, that would make you two siblings too, and that won't really work since your married."

Nora's head shot up with a gasp. "Renny and I are not siblings! He's my husband. But we want a brother, but I want Ren. Aaand Ren wants me," she did that last part in a sing song tone as she clung to Ren's arm.

Ren gave his signature smirk. "How about Jaune is a brother to one of us, and a brother-in-law to the other one. What do you say Jaune?"

"Oohh, I like that idea Renny!"

Jaune just glanced over to the bouncing Nora, before answering with his bright smile. "That sounds great Ren. I already got seven sisters, do you mind being my brother then?"

"That works for me, Nora is that all right with you."

Nora puffed out her cheeks as she glared at Jaune. "Brothers fight a lot. How do I know you won't hurt Ren if he's your brother?"

Jaune held his hands up in defense. "Hey, This was an accident, it won't happen ever again. Also I'll never hurt family."

Nora leapt off of Ren's arm and hefted out a stack of papers from a nearby desk. "I want written proof buster, Sign here, initial here, and signature here."

Jaune looked to Ren again for answers, and thankfully his teammate-brother already knew the answer. "She wanted to smash your legs to ensure you could not hurt me, I talked her into a written agreement that banned you from taking any harmful action she could think of against me. Somehow she found a way for you being armed with a feather as a way to kill me. "

Jaune laughed a deep and real laugh. How long has it been sense he actually laughed like this? Beacon he thought, its bean nearly a year since he actually laughed a real genuine laugh. _"Thank you Nora, I needed that."_

"All right, let's get this over with, I got community service in three hours and need some sleep. Where do I sign again?"

* * *

Neo stormed into her motel room and slumped into her bed. She was glad that Cindy was gone right now. She already had enough of a headache dealing with stupid all night. At least she got her daily fill of ice cream though.

She rolled over and pulled out her scroll. Jaune was a nice guy, but a dumb one. It was almost certain that he would blab his mouth off about Pep to his gang. If they got nosy they would try to search for her. She couldn't have the rest of them chasing after her yet.

It took a bit of time but she managed to hack into Atlas department of Registration, and the Schnee employment logs. Now she simply had to adapt the fake identity files Roman had made for them. They needed a bit of updating to match up with current events but that's nothing to difficult.

Once she was done, she uploaded and properly backdated the documents. She grinned pleased with her little accomplishment and began to erase her hacker footprint.

Once it was done she closed off her terminal and looked over the updated false identification she had. Patty Peppermint. She swiped her digital ID to the side, and a new one took its place.

It showed a middle aged male, with spiky neon blue hair that was squashed down by his black bowler with a red band. The red trimmed lapel of a spiffy dark blue coat could be seen as well. But what she admired the most was that sly cheeky grin the man wore.

The ID read his name to be, Billy Blueberry. Neo had to silently laugh at that.

Roman never was one to pick good cover names.

_"What you named your false self after a food, and you look like it too. So I'll do the same." Roman spun on heel, his blue coat tails flying out. He suddenly stopped and placed a hand on the rim of his hat, in a dramatic pose. "Meet Billy Blueberry, the sharpest looking hunter for hire you'll ever meet." _

Neo couldn't help but let out a sad chuckle at that memory. She clutched the scroll close to her chest. She rolled to her side so Cindy wouldn't see her face when she walked in. Neo let herself drift off to sleep.

Only her old motel pillow would ever be able to tell you how many tears she shed that morning as she cried herself to sleep.

* * *

If the alarm didn't wake Jaune up then Nora's hammer smashing it to pieces in front of his face certainly did.

With his heart pounding a mile a minute, he gave the sleeping Nora a glare and then gathered his close for the day and headed for the bathroom.

Trying to leave his doom as quietly as possible nearly worked out as well, if it wasn't for bumping into Yang on the way out.

"Oh Sorry . . . Hey Vomit Boy!"

"Yang not now please, I got to—"

"No. Now's the perfect time." She grabbed him by the color and began to drag him away. "We're heading to the sparing rings right now. Better clear your schedule."

Jaune struggled, and broke out of her grip. Bad side to that is he was left unbalanced and crashed through team RWBY's ajar dorm door.

"Geez, Vomit boy, now you really done it. First scaring us with potential murder and now peeping on girls getting dressed. Again you're lucky Ruby was not harmed." She cracked her knuckles.

Jaune's head went on a swivel taking in his surroundings. He balked momentarily at Blake's new hear cut. But that only held his attention for a moment, as Yang dragged him up from the floor. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't make this room into a sparing ring."

"Wait, please, this . . ." he threw his arms out to gesture to his current situation. "Was just an accident I was just trying to get to a meeting, that's all."

"Friend Yang, he is telling the truth. His heart rate, despite increasing from panic had not done so when it told you of his intensions."

His head turned and eyes soon fixed on the girl sat in front of Blake. With her back turned to him was Penny. Half her face covered in white bandages. The one uncovered green eye widened as she caught site of Jaune in the mirror. "Friend Jaune! No, do not look, I am not decent!"

In mere seconds Penny blasted herself into the team RWBY's bathroom and slammed the door.

"OH you buffoon!" Weiss snatched Jaune by the ear and hulled him out of Yang's grip.

"Ow, Ow Ow! Weiss stop please," he begged.

Weiss let go and planted her hands in her hips. "Well Jaune anything you have to say for yourself?"

Jaune looked around the room and sighed. "Yeah, I'm sorry about how I acted yesterday. I wasn't thinking straight and I should have had more self-control." Weiss nodded along with this, so far pleased with his response.

Jaune turned to Blake, who just stood at the vanity, arm crossed scowl on her face and ears flat on her head. "Blake, I'm sorry about burning you-"

"You better be sorry Vomit boy"

Jaune just ignored Yang as did the others. "I didn't even know I did that at the time. But, thank you for bringing me back to Remnant Blake. I'm not sure what I would have done if you hadn't played that video. Thanks."

Blake relaxed a bit and smiled slightly. "Apology accepted Jaune, but next time you want to go berserk like that, please save it for the grim. All right?"

"I will Blake." Jaune raised his voice. "Penny I'm really sorry for hurting you. Is, is there I way I could help? Maybe I could help you recover faster with my semblance?"

Penny's muffled voice emanated from the bathroom. "Thank you Friend Jaune, but you semblance cannot help me. My synthetic skin doses not grow like yours and in unaffected by my aura. I should be fine by the end of the day. But I am still Battle Ready!"

Jaune cringed at himself, of course she didn't need him to help her heal, Penny didn't have all that squishy flesh that aura normally healed.

"Well Jaune, is that all you have to say?"

Jaune turned back to the still night gown clad Weiss as she tapped her bare foot in the floor. "Ahh . . . you look good in that nightgown?"

Weiss's face turned bright red with embarrassment and anger as Yang doubled over in laughter out in the hall. "You insufferable fool‼"

She grabbed his ear in a vice grip that he swore could rival Nora's and dragged him out of their dorm before tossing him into Yang. "Knock next time you want to talk with us‼"

Weiss slammed the door hard enough to cause some dust to fall from a now damaged door frame.

Yang propped herself back up catching her breath. "All right Vomit boy, for that you get today off from fighting me."

"Gees thanks Yang," sarcasm thick in his voice. "You know where Ruby is though? I owe her an apology too?"

"Hmm?" Yang didn't answer at first, most likely weighing the possibilities. "She's been with Oscar since you put him in the hospital. You can apologies latter she needs some time to think anyways. And you're not going anywhere near either of them unless I'm there too"

"Oh, Oh Kay I'll stop by after I finish my community service for the day,"

"Community service? What's that about?"

"Ironwood's punishment for what I did yesterday."

"Really? I didn't think a headmaster would assign such a thing. That always seemed like something Ms. Goodwitch would do. But I'm glad to see you got what's coming to you."

"I guess so, well I gotta get to work, see yah later Yang." With that Jaune left down the hallway.

* * *

At the end of the day, community service was not that hard. Winter assigned him with cleaning off graffiti down in Mantel. The bad part about the community service was that Penny was his in site supervisor. Every time he finished cleaning one wall she would snatch him up and fly over to the next one.

Flying with Penny was the worst feeling imaginable for him. His stomach flipped and turned, and the sight of being that high up made him nearly pass out every time. She would land just before he lost his stomach though. He figured that was her payback for damaging her face. She did wear her bandages all that day.

He managed about nine hours of work. So that was a good thing. It freed him up a little incase he was needed elsewhere tomorrow. But now he needed to do one last thing, something that has bothered him even more than flying with Penny. Facing Ruby and Oscar after what he did.

* * *

**A.N. Thank you all for reading, and maybe reviewing, my story A Silent Connection. The idea and concept for this story was originally that of my Beta readers EnderFire1, and JourneysEnd1. I would like to thank them for offering me a chance to bring their ideas to life in this story. **

**I would also like to than ****Miasushi, and Pikminfan for helping me come up with such a perfect name for this story.**

**So, I want to apologies to all of you readers for the really late update. I actually had the main bulk of this chapter done back in december but it lacked emotions and proper setting. With writers block and a new semester starting it was really hard to fix up this chapter. I hope you guys and gals liked it.**

**Also one of my Author friends started leaving me shout outs in their stories, So I cannot leave them hanging. Here are a few good stories to read.**

**A Rosegarden Seedling By ****Miasushi, A great RubyxOscar fic that works out most of the negatives with that ship.**

**Pink Lemonade By EnderFire1 another JaunexNeo fic without as much nefarious plans in it.**

**Desires for power (OC story) By killua menace a pretty decent OC team story, though I maybe biased on that one.**

**and finally **

**Lost Star By ****Emma Nonn a pretty good GlyndaxOC fic, be warned it's rated M for language.**


End file.
